BV  1534  .C3  1911 
Carmack,  Harry  Edgar,  1864- 
How  to  teach  a  Sunday-school 
lesson 


How  to  Teach  a  Sunday- 
School  Lesson 


.     By 
H.  E.  CARMACK 


^'i  OF  PHiiTcl 

MAY   1   1911 


New  York  Chicago  Toronto 

Fleming   H.   Revell    Company 


London 


AND 


Edinburgh 


Copyright,  191 1,  by 
FLEMING  H.    REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago:  123  North  Wabash  Ave. 
Toronto:  25  Richmond  Street,  W. 
London:  21  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh:      100    Princes    Street 


To  Harold  and  Robert.- 

We  have  had  many  walks  and  talks 
together^  not  the  least  delightful  being 
those  on  the  way  to  Suiiday-school  every 
Sunday  morning  since  yon  ivere  old 
enough  to  zvalk.  In  memory  of  these 
good  times ^  I  dedicate  this  little  book  to 
you,  and  knowing  that  you  ivould  never 
forgive  me  if  I  failed  to  do  so,  I  also  join 
with  you  in  this  dedication  the  member  of 
the  Home  Departme7it  who,  as  we  three 
are  agreed,  is  the  best  little  woman  in  the 
world  and  whom  I  call  Wife  and  you 
call  Mother. 

Your  Father. 


Preface 

THIS  book  is  another  attempt  to  apply 
the  principles  of  psychology  and 
pedagogy  to  the  work  of  Sunday- 
school  teaching.  As  so  many  excellent 
manuals  have  already  appeared  on  the  sub- 
ject, a  word  of  explanation  and  perhaps  of 
apology  is  due  as  to  why  the  author  ventures 
into  this  field.  He  began  his  work  as  a 
Sunday-school  teacher,  as  so  many  other 
teachers  have  begun,  without  any  previous 
training,  and  has  acquired  his  knowledge 
through  a  long  and  trying  experience  in  the 
actual  work  of  the  Sunday-school.  This, 
together  with  many  years  of  active  service 
in  the  organized  work  of  the  Sunday-school, 
in  teachers'  meetings,  institutes  and  con- 
ventions, has  given  him,  he  feels,  an  under- 
standing of  the  needs  of  the  average  Sunday- 
school  teacher.  Especially  does  he  sympa- 
thize with  those  teachers,  by  far  the  greater 
number  engaged  in  the  work,  who  have  had 
7 


8  Preface 

no  psychological  or  pedagogical  training. 
In  studying  many  of  the  books  that  have 
been  written  on  this  subject,  he  has  often 
found  that  there  was  a  gap  between  the 
theory  as  laid  down  in  the  book  and  the 
teaching  of  a  lesson,  a  gap  easily  crossed 
perhaps  by  the  expert,  but  too  wide  and 
too  difficult  for  the  average  teacher.  It  has 
been  his  desire  to  write  a  book  which  the 
teacher  can  use  as  a  guide  in  the  preparation 
of  each  lesson,  to  give  a  lesson  plan  that  is 
thoroughly  scientific  and  to  explain  each  step 
so  plainly  and  so  simply,  and  with  such 
abundance  of  illustration,  that  any  teacher 
can  follow  it. 

If  this  book,  therefore,  has  any  value  dis- 
tinct from  other  books  on  the  same  subject, 
the  writer  believes  that  it  lies  in  the  point  of 
view  from  which  it  has  been  written,  that  of 
one  who  has  himself  travelled  the  hard  and 
difficult  road.  To  help  those  who  follow 
over  the  difficulties,  to  save  them  from  the 
mistakes,  the  discouragements  and  the  fail- 
ures which  he  knows  so  well,  and  to  help 
them  to  know  the  joy  of  skillful  and  success- 


Preface  9 

ful  effort  which  he  has  also  tasted  :  for  this 
he  has  written  this  little  book.  If  it  shall, 
even  in  a  small  way,  accomplish  its  object  he 
will  be  well  content. 

For  convenience  the  author  has,  all  through 
the  book,  used  the  masculine  pronoun  in  re- 
ferring to  the  pupil,  and  the  feminine  pro- 
noun for  the  teacher. 

The  author's  indebtedness  to  others  who 
have  preceded  him  will  be  apparent.  He 
wishes  especially  to  acknowledge  the  help  he 
has  received  from  Prof.  Charles  McMurry's 
"  Method  of  the  Recitation,"  a  book  that 
should  be  in  the  hands  of  every  Sunday- 
school  teacher. 

H.  E.  C. 

IVilkinsburg,  Pennsylvania. 


Contents 


PART  I 
PLANNING  THE  CAMPAIGN 

I.  The  Sunday-School  Teacher's  Aim 

II.  The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth 

III.  The  Citadel  of  the  Will 

IV.  Facts  and  Truths 

V.  The  First  Advance     . 


13 

17 
29 

33 
42 


PART  II 

THE  ATTACK  ON  THE  IMAGINATION 

VI.  The  Importance  of  the  Imagination   .        55 

VII.  General  Preparation  .         .         .61 

VIII.  Special  Preparation  ....       70 

IX.  Presenting  the  Lesson  Facts       .         .       89 

PART  III 
CAPTURING  THE  EMOTIONS 

X.  What  is  Interest  ?     .  .         .  •97 

XI.  Interest  in  Lesson  Facts     .  .  .104 

XII.  Interest  in  Lesson  Truths  .         .125 

II 


1 2  Contents 

PART  IV 
LAYING  SIEGE  TO  THE  REASON 

XIII.  Induction  .  .  .         .         .132 

XIV.  Deduction  .         .         .         .         .138 

PART  V 
FINAL  SUGGESTIONS 

XV.  Special  Lessons  .  .  .  .148 

XVI.  The  Consciousness  OF  God  *         .     152 


I 

THE  SUNDAY-SCHOOL  TEACHER'S  AIM 

IN  order  to  teach  a  Sunday-school  lesson 
well,  the  teacher  must  have  in  mind  a 
clear  and  well-defined  aim.     The  writer 
once  playfully  asked  a  young  lady  friend  of 
his  to  discharge  a  revolver.     She  took  the 
weapon  gingerly  in  her  fingers, 
of^an'Sm"  held   it   out  at  arm's  length, 

closed  her  eyes,  and  pulled  the 
trigger.  A  good  deal  of  Sunday-school 
teaching  is  done  pretty  much  in  the  same 
way.  The  results  are  such  as  must  be  ex- 
pected from  such  a  haphazard  way  of  pro- 
ceeding. Contrast  with  this  the  aim  of  those 
chosen  men  of  the  tribe  of  Benjamin,  seven 
hundred  of  them,  every  one  of  whom  knew  so 
well  how  to  use  the  sling. ^  These  men  had 
learned  to  fix  their  eyes  on  the  object  they 
wished  to  hit,  and  to  keep  them  there  until 

•  Judges  XX.  i6. 


14  Planning  the  Campaign 

the  stone  from  the  sling  went  straight  to  its 
mark.  Thus  by  keeping  the  object  clearly 
in  view,  and  by  repeated  efforts,  they  acquired 
that  wonderful  skill  which  is  so  graphically 
described  as  "  throwing  at  an  hair's  breadth 
and  not  miss."  When  our  Sunday-school 
teachers,  in  the  preparation  of  their  lessons, 
and  when  they  take  their  places  before  their 
classes,  learn  to  keep  in  mind  just  what  they 
propose  to  accomplish,  we  will  have  far  more 
effective  teaching  in  our  Sunday-schools. 

The  purpose  of  the  Sunday-school  has 
been  given  thus :  "  To  bring  the  pupil  to 
Christ,  to  build  him  up  in- 
IZ'Z-lToi  Christ,  and  to  send  him 
forth  to  work  for  Christ." 
This  is  a  good  definition  of  the  general  pur- 
pose of  the  Sunday-school  but  it  is  too  broad 
to  be  of  much  help  in  the  teaching  of  a  par- 
ticular lesson.  It  is  well  to  distinguish  be- 
tween what  the  teacher  seeks  to  do,  and  what 
the  pupil  is  to  do  as  a  result  of  the  teach- 
ing. What  the  teacher  seeks  to  do  is  one 
thing,  what  the  results  of  that  teaching  may 
be  in  the  life  of  the  pupil  is  quite  another 


The  Sunday-School  Teacher's  Aim     15 

thing.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  teacher  does 
not  bring  the  pupil  to  Christ.  If  he  comes 
he  must  do  so  of  his  own  free  will  and  choice. 
The  teacher  does  not  build  the  pupil  up  in 
Christ.  He  grows  towards  the  Christlike 
character  by  daily  and  hourly  choices  in  right 
living.  The  teacher  does  not  send  him  forth 
to  work  for  Christ.  The  life  of  service  must 
also  be  entered  upon  by  him  out  of  love  for 
Christ,  and  a  desire  to  do  His  will  in  the 
world.  But  there  is  something  that  must  be 
done  before  the  pupil  can  be  led  to  make 
these  choices.     What  is  it  ? 

St.  Paul  writes  to  the  Thessalonians  of  "  the 
Word  of  God  which  effectually  worketh  also 

in  you  that  believe."  ^  It  is 
Sb;;Sl"  Point        the  Word  of  God  in  the  mind 

and  heart  that  leads  to  right 
action  in  the  life.  It  is  the  teacher's  work  to 
plant  the  truth  in  the  mind  of  the  pupil.  It 
is  the  pupil's  work  to  act  upon  it  and  thereby 
transmute  it  into  character.  Yet  while  the 
teacher's  work  is  to  teach  and  the  pupil's  to 
act,  a  great  deal  depends  upon  the  way  in 

1  I  Thess.  ii.  13. 


l6  Planning  the  Campaign 

which  the  truth  is  lodged  in  the  pupil's  mind, 
as  to  whether  it  shall  influence  his  action. 
Much  Sunday-school  teaching  is  done  upon 
the  theory  that  all  that  is  necessary  is  simply 
to  point  out  the  truth  as  it  lies  imbedded  in 
the  lesson,  and  thereupon  the  mind  of  the 
pupil  will  seize  upon  it,  assimilate  it  and  act 
upon  it.  This  is  a  great  mistake.  We  have 
been  told  again  and  again  that  "telling  is 
not  teaching."  Nor  is  it  sufficient  simply  to 
lodge  an  abstract  truth  in  the  memory  of  the 
pupil.  It  is  a  familiar  fact  that  pupils  may 
commit  to  memory  hundreds  of  Bible  verses 
without  such  verses  having  any  very  per- 
ceptible influence  upon  their  lives.  Not 
mere  knowledge  but  action  is  the  aim  in 
Sunday-school  teaching.  How  to  reach  the 
will  of  the  pupil  is  the  great  problem.  Not 
simply  to  lay  the  truth  before  the  mind  of  the 
pupil,  but  to  drive  it  home  to  his  will  should 
be  the  teacher's  aim  in  the  teaching  of  every 
lesson. 


II 

THE  CAREER  OF  A  LESSON  TRUTH 

*'  "T"  N  each  of  us  when  awake  (and  often 
I  when  asleep),"  says  Prof.  William 
James  in  his  "Talks  to  Teachers," 
"  some  kind  of  consciousness  is  always  go- 
ing on.     There  is  a  stream,  a  succession  of 

states  or  waves  or  fields  (or 
^ci:'!",""'"^"'   whatever  you   please   to  call 

them)  of  knowledge,  of  feel- 
ing, of  desire,  of  deliberation,  etc.,  that  con- 
stantly pass  and  repass,  and  that  constitute 
our  inner  life.  .  .  .  These  concrete  fields 
are  always  complex.  They  contain  sensa- 
tions of  our  bodies  and  of  the  objects  around 
us,  memories  of  past  experiences  and  thoughts 
of  distant  things,  feelings  of  satisfaction  and 
dissatisfaction,  desires  and  aversions  and 
other  emotional  conditions,  together  with 
determinations  of  the  will,  in  every  variety 
of  permutation  and  combination.  ...  In 
17 


l8  Planning  the  Campaign 

the  successive  mutations  of  our  fields  of  con- 
sciousness, the  process  by  which  one  dis- 
solves into  another  is  often  very  gradual, 
and  all  sorts  of  inner  rearrangements  of  con- 
tents occur.  Sometimes  the  focus  remains 
but  little  changed  while  the  margin  alters 
rapidly.  Sometimes  the  focus  alters  and  the 
margin  stays.  Sometimes  focus  and  margin 
change  places.  Sometimes,  again,  abrupt 
alterations  of  the  whole  field  occur."  ^ 

Into  this  complex,  flowing  stream  of  con- 
sciousness, the  teacher  launches  the  lesson 
truth.     What  shall  be  its  fate  ? 

Immediate  ^j^^    j^jg^j    ^.^g^j^  ^f  ^  sklllfully 

taught  lesson  would  be  im- 
mediate action.  On  the  great  Day  of  Pente- 
cost, when  Peter  concluded  his  sermon,  the 
multitude  cried  out,  **  Men  and  brethren, 
what  shall  we  do?"  and  "  they  that  gladly 
received  the  word  were  baptized."  ^  When 
Saul  on  the  way  to  Damascus  saw  a  great 
light,  and  heard  the  voice  of  Jesus  saying, 
"  I  am  Jesus  of  Nazareth  whom  thou  perse- 
cutest,"  he  said,  "  What  shall  I  do.  Lord  ?  "  ^ 

1  Op.  cit.,  p.  15  fF.        « Acts  ii.  37,  41.  '  Acts  xxii.  8,  10. 


The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth         1 9 

When  Paul  told  the  jailer  of  Philippi  to  "  be- 
lieve on  the  Lord  Jesus  and  thou  shalt  be 
saved,"  "  he  took  them  that  same  hour  of 
the  night,  and  washed  their  stripes,  and  was 
baptized,  he  and  all  his,  immediately.  And 
he  brought  them  up  into  his  house,  and  set 
food  before  them,  and  rejoiced  greatly,  with 
all  his  house,  having  believed  in  God."  ^ 

The  difficulty  is  that,  with  so  many  lessons, 
there  can  be  no  immediate  opportunity  to 

put  them  into  practice.  Some 
ponl?^"*"  ti^e   ^"St   elapse  before  the 

truth  can  be  put  into  action. 
In  the  meantime  the  truth  drops  out  of  con- 
sciousness. Even  where  there  is  a  strong 
impulse  to  act,  the  impression  dies  away  and 
the  impulse  is  no  longer  felt.  We  are  fa- 
miliar with  this  experience  in  listening 
to  a  sermon.  How  often  as  we  have  lis- 
tened, the  eloquence  and  spiritual  power  of 
the  preacher  have  so  worked  upon  us  that 
we  have  felt  a  strong  resolve  forming  within 
us  to  go  out  from  the  church  and  forthwith 
begin  to  do  something  to  make  the  world 

'  Actsxvi.  31,33, 34. 


20  Planning  the  Campaign 

better.  But  when  the  sermon  is  ended  and 
the  service  is  over,  other  thoughts  quickly 
come  into  the  mind,  the  impulse  dies  away, 
the  great  truth  of  the  sermon  drops  out  of 
the  consciousness,  and  we  go  back  to  the 
old  ways,  apparently  no  farther  along  in  the 
Christian  life  than  we  were  before. 

Since,  then,  in  most  cases,  immediate  ac- 
tion cannot  or  does  not  follow,  what  may  we 

hope  for?  When  the  truth 
Queswons  drops    out   of    consciousuess, 

will  it  fade  away  never  to  be 
recalled  ?  Or  will  the  pupil  recall  the  lesson 
during  the  following  week,  or  at  some  future 
time  in  his  life  ?  If  so,  how  often  will  it  be 
recalled  ?  If  any  thought  from  the  lesson 
does  recur  to  him,  under  what  circumstances 
will  it  be  recalled  ?  With  how  much  vivid- 
ness and  power  will  it  come  ?  Will  it  enter 
his  mind  spontaneously  and  at  the  right  mo- 
ment? If  it  does,  what  will  be  its  effect? 
These  are  interesting  and  important  ques- 
tions which  every  teacher  must  ask  concern- 
ing the  lesson  taught.  It  would  be  an  en- 
lightening experience  if  it  were  possible  for 


The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth         2 1 

the  teacher  to  follow  the  career  of  a  lesson 
truth  in  the  mind  of  her  pupil  and  find  the 
answers  to  these  questions.  This  of  course  she 
cannot  hope  to  do.  She  can,  however,  study 
the  mind  of  the  pupil ;  she  can  learn  the  laws 
which  it  follows  in  the  hearing,  assimilation 
and  use  of  truth ;  she  can  acquire  skill  in  us- 
ing those  laws  in  her  teaching,  and  with  such 
knowledge  and  skill  in  teaching  she  may 
count  on  sure  results  in  the  life  of  her  pupil, 
even  though  she  may  not  follow  and  watch 
the  effect  of  the  truth.  To  aid  the  teacher  in 
acquiring  such  knowledge  and  skill  is  the 
purpose  of  these  chapters.  Before  taking  up 
the  study  of  the  steps  in  teaching,  the  follow- 
ing considerations  are  offered  as  throwing 
some  light  on  the  questions  above  pro- 
pounded. 

Consciousness   is   impulsive.     Every  idea 

that  comes  into  the  mind  tends  to  flow  out 

into   action.      If    ideas  came 

..consciousness       ^.^^^^    ^^^     remained    long 

enough  they  would  always  re- 
sult in  action  of  some  sort.  But  conscious- 
ness is  also  complex.     While  we  cannot  tell 


22  Planning  the  Campaign 

just  what  the  state  of  mind  of  the  pupil  may 
be  when  the  lesson  truth  comes  before  it,  we 
know  some  things  in  a  general  way  which 
help  us  to  study  its  effect.  There  is  a  certain 
amount  of  inertia  in  the  mind  as  there  is  in 
material  things,  and  there  must  be  sufficient 
intensity  in  a  given  state  of  mind  to  over- 
come this  inertia.  Again  there  may  be  the 
strong  pull  of  habit,  the  nervous  energy 
generated  by  the  thought  tending  to  flow  out 
along  old  channels  worn  by  repeated  action. 
There  may  be  other  ideas  struggling  to  gain 
the  focus  of  consciousness.  The  mind  may 
be  the  battle-ground  of  ideas.  The  probabil- 
ity of  the  lesson  truth  coming  into  and  hold- 
ing the  centre  of  consciousness  for  such  a 
length  of  time  and  with  such  vividness  and 
emotional  intensity  as  to  lead  to  action,  will 
depend  upon  the  number  of  faculties  brought 
into  play  in  its  teaching,  upon  the  interest  or 
emotion  awakened  by  its  teaching,  upon  the 
manner  in  which  it  is  associated  with  other 
thoughts  in  the  mind,  and  upon  the  closeness 
of  connection  between  the  truth  taught  and 
the  choice  to  be  made. 


The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth         23 

Most  Sunday-school  teachers  have  a  vague 
idea  in  their  minds  that  the  pupil  will  go  out 

into  the  world  and  put  into 
Foriowfne  prompt    action    through    the 

week  the  lesson  taught  to 
him  on  Sunday.  They  would  be  surprised 
if  they  knew  how  often  the  lesson  goes  out 
of  his  mind  not  to  return  for  a  long  time  to 
come. 

The  lesson  on  Peter  and  Cornelius  in  the 
tenth   chapter  of   Acts   was   taught   in   one 

Sunday-school  recently.  This 
Illustration  chapter  is  full  of  great  thoughts 

about  God,  His  answers  to 
prayer,  His  providential  working,  and  His 
love  for  every  one  of  His  creatures.  It  is 
rich  in  material  that  might  be  used  in  daily 
life  for  guidance,  inspiration  and  strength. 
A  few  days  after  the  lesson  was  taught,  a 
bright  fourteen-year-old  boy  was  asked : 
"  Have  you  thought  about  the  Sunday-school 
lesson  this  week?"  "No,"  was  the  answer. 
"  Do  you  remember  whether  any  single 
thought  or  word  that  your  teacher  spoke  to 
you  last  Sunday  has  come  into  your  mind  at 


24  Planning  the  Campaign 

any  time  during  the  past  few  days  ?"  "  No, 
I  cannot  remember  that  I  have  thought  of  a 
word  of  it  since."  This  case  is  probably  not 
an  exception. 

Let  it  be  noted  here  that  it  is  not  a  ques- 
tion of  how  much  he  can  recall  of  the  lesson 
upon  review.     In  the  review 

Not  a  Question  of 

What  He  Remem-    thcrc  is  a  mental  effort  made 

bers  on  Review 

to  recall  the  lesson,  there  is 
time  for  the  memory  to  work,  and  he  is  as- 
sisted by  the  questions  of  the  teacher.  But 
to  influence  his  choices,  it  must  come  into  his 
mind  without  these  aids. 

Even  though  prompt   action  does  not  fol- 
low, or  the  pupil  does  not  recall  the  lesson 

during  the  days  immediately 
L'p^etr  """*      following,  it  may  not  be  lost. 

There  grows  up  in  the  mind 
of  the  pupil  a  fund  of  knowledge  and  truth 
upon  which  he  draws  in  forming  his  judg- 
ments and  making  his  choices.  The  funda- 
mental truths  of  religion  after  all  are  not 
many  in  number.  It  may  be  that  he  has 
learned  them  at  his  mother's  knee.  The  les- 
son truth  of  any  given  Sunday  may  be  one 


The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth         25 

with  which  he  has  long  been  famiHar,  and 
upon  which  he  has  acted  so  often  that  it  has 
become  thoroughly  assimilated  with  his  men- 
tal life.  The  lesson  in  such  a  case  would 
simply  refresh  his  memory  and  renew  a  past 
impression,  and  in  a  given  situation,  might 
influence  his  action,  without  his  distinctly  re- 
calling that  it  was  taught  to  him  recently  in 
the  Sunday-school.  Beyond  doubt  such  is 
the  effect  of  many  lessons. 

Again  the  truth  taught,  even  though  a  new 

truth,    may  yet  be  so  closely  connected  with 

the  general  fund  of  truth  al- 

Addingto  His 

General  Fund  of  ready  acQulrcd  by  him,  that 
immediately  and  almost  with- 
out mental  effort,  it  blends  with  this  general 
fund,  and  is  thereafter  not  distinguished 
from  it.  Thus,  for  example,  the  pupil  has  in 
his  mind  a  certain  general  conception  of  God. 
The  lesson  may  give  some  new  aspect  of  the 
character  of  God  which  would  add  just  a  lit- 
tle to  the  definiteness  of  his  conception,  and 
this  would  have  its  influence  upon  his  daily 
life,  without  his  clearly  distinguishing  be- 
tween the  truth  taught  last  Sabbath,  and  the 


26  Planning  the  Campaign 

general  conception  that  is  in  his  mind.  It 
should  be  the  constant  effort  of  the  teacher  to 
connect  the  truth  of  the  lesson  with  those  pre- 
viously taught  so  as  to  build  up  in  the  mind 
of  the  pupil  a  well  arranged,  closely  con- 
nected fund  of  religious  truth. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  also  that  memory 
is  a  very  remarkable  power.     It  is  probable 

that  no  idea  that  has  once  en- 
Memory  tered  the  mind  is  ever  entirely 

lost.  While  we  know  that  the 
memory  works  largely  by  the  association  of 
ideas,  we  are  unable  to  follow  the  intricacies 
of  these  mental  associations.  Ideas  long 
buried  sometimes  flash  into  the  mind,  and  we 
are  unable  to  trace  any  connection  between 
them  and  the  thoughts  previously  there. 
New  experiences  recall  former  thoughts  and 
feelings,  and  they  come  back  with  new  fresh- 
ness and  power.  Thoughts  which  seemed  to 
have  been  long  dead  are  suddenly  revital- 
ized and  glow  with  new  force  and  meaning 
in  the  light  of  new  experience.  Lessons 
taught  in  childhood  may  come  back  with  con- 
victing and  regenerating  power  in  manhood. 


The  Career  of  a  Lesson  Truth         27 

Yet  after  all  this  has  been  said  and  taking 
the  most  hopeful  view  of  the  matter  possible, 
it  is  still  true  that  the  les- 
A  Lost  Lesson  SOU  may  be  so  taught  and  the 
impression  made  may  be  so 
slight  that  it  is  swiftly  swept  to  one  side  in 
the  stream  of  consciousness,  like  a  piece  of 
driftwood,  and  it  goes  out  of  the  mind  never 
again  to  reappear  in  any  way  to  influence  the 
life.  Thus  the  teacher's  time  may  be  wasted, 
and  the  precious  lesson  hour  may  become  a 
lost  opportunity. 

In  all  that  has  just  been  said,  regard  has 
been  had  only  to  the  unaided  powers  of  the 
pupil's  own  mind.  We  must 
The  Holy  Spirit  ncvcr  forgct  that  in  our  teach- 
ing we  may  have  the  assist- 
ance of  a  wiser  and  mightier  teacher.  "  But 
the  Comforter,  even  the  Holy  Spirit,  whom 
the  Father  will  send  in  My  name.  He  shall 
teach  you  all  things,  and  bring  to  your  re- 
membrance all  that  I  have  said  unto  you."  ^ 
The  teacher  may  have  the  help  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  both  in  the  preparation  and  in 

1  John  xiv.  26. 


28  Planning  the  Campaign 

the  teaching  of  the  lesson.  The  teacher  may 
have  the  help  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to  prepare 
the  mind  of  the  pupil  to  receive  the  truth. 
But  the  Holy  Spirit  will  not  violate  the  laws 
of  the  mind  which  God  has  impressed  upon 
it.  If  the  teacher,  either  through  ignorance 
of  those  laws,  or  lack  of  preparation  of  the 
lesson,  does  not  follow  and  obey  them  in 
teaching  the  truth,  so  that  it  does  not  really 
enter  the  mind  of  the  pupil,  she  has  no  right 
to  expect  the  Holy  Spirit  to  aid  her,  nor  has 
she  any  right  to  expect  that  He  will  follow 
the  truth  and  use  it  in  influencing  the  pupil's 
life.  He  may  do  this.  The  work  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  upon  the  human  soul  is  indeed  a  deep 
mystery.  Just  when  and  where  and  how  He 
may  use  God's  word  to  influence  the  soul  of 
the  pupil  we  cannot  know.  But  this  is  no  ex- 
cuse for  lack  of  preparation  and  skill  on  the 
part  of  the  teacher.  Certainly  He  is  more 
likely  to  use  the  truth  that  is  well  taught  by 
a  thoroughly  prepared  and  trained  teacher, 
than  that  which  is  taught  by  one  who  is  un- 
prepared. 


Ill 

THE  CITADEL  OF  THE  WILL 

BUNYAN  in  his  "  Holy  War  "  tells  us 
that  in  the  country  of  the  "Universe" 
was  a  fair  and  delicate  town  and  cor- 
poration called  "  Mansoul,"  a  town  for  its 
building  so  curious,  for  its  situation  so  com- 
modious, for  its  privileges  so 
"The  Holy  War"  advautageous  that  with  refer- 
ence to  its  original  state  there 
was  not  its  equal  under  heaven.  Its  founder 
was  Shaddai,  who  built  it  for  his  own  delight. 
In  the  midst  of  the  town  was  a  famous  and 
stately  palace  which  Shaddai  intended  for 
himself.  He  had  no  intention  of  allowing 
strangers  to  intrude  there.  And  the  pecul- 
iarity of  the  place  was  that  the  walls  of  Man- 
soul  could  never  be  broken  down  or  hurt 
unless  the  townsmen  consented.  Mansoul 
had  five  gates,  which,  in  like  manner,  could 

only  be   forced   if  those  within   allowed   it. 
29 


3©  Planning  the  Campaign 

These  were  Eargate,  Eyegate,  Mouthgate, 
Nosegate,  and  Feelgate.  Thus  provided, 
Mansoul  was  at  first  all  that  its  founder 
could  desire.  It  had  the  most  excellent  laws 
in  the  world. 

Thus   under  the  figure  of  a  walled  city, 
Bunyan  pictures  the  soul  and  its  capture  by 

Satan  and  its  redemption  by 
fhrMTn?  °'  Christ.     In  studying  the  prob- 

lem  of  how  to  reach  the  will 
of  the  pupil,  it  will  be  helpful  to  use  some- 
what the  same  figure.  In  ancient  times, 
many  cities  were  defended  by  a  series  of 
walls  one  within  the  other.  In  the  heart  of 
such  a  city,  there  would  be  a  central  citadel, 
built  of  stone,  with  walls  twenty  or  thirty 
feet  thick,  and  sometimes  when  one  after  an- 
other of  the  walls  was  taken,  still  the  citadel 
held  out  for  years.  So  we  may  picture  the 
mind  as  having  a  series  of  ramparts,  the 
outer  one  being  sensation,  the  second,  mem- 
ory, the  third,  imagination,  the  fourth,  the 
feelings,  the  fifth,  the  reason,  and  at  last  in 
the  centre  of  being,  the  will.  These  several 
powers  are  named  in  this  order  because  of 


The  Citadel  of  the  Will  31 

the  increasing  difficulty  in  reaching  and 
arousing  them  to  action.  The  senses  lie,  as 
it  were,  on  the  outer  surface  of  the  mind.  It 
is  easy  to  arouse  them  to  activity.  Indeed  it 
is  only  too  easy,  as  every  teacher,  especially 
the  teacher  of  the  little  children,  has  dis- 
covered. It  is  harder  to  awaken  the  mem- 
ory, and  it  takes  greater  mental  effort  to  use 
it  than  it  does  to  use  the  senses.  To  get  the 
imagination  to  work  is  still  more  difficult. 
It  is  largely  through  the  memory  and  the 
imagination  that  the  emotions  are  stirred. 
The  reasoning  powers  are  the  last  to  develop, 
and  are  still  more  difficult  to  arouse.  The 
will  is  the  hardest  of  all  to  move.  Thus  it 
will  be  seen  that  there  is  real  truth  in  the 
figure  of  the  rampart  within  rampart,  each 
of  which  the  teacher  must  capture  in  order 
to  reach  the  will.  But  when  the  sensations 
are  captured,  the  memory  stirred,  the  imag- 
ination quickened,  the  emotions  aroused,  and 
the  reason  convinced  by  the  truth,  then  the 
will  is  likely  to  be  swept  into  action.  In 
other  words,  the  greater  the  number  of  men- 
tal powers  that  are  brought  into  use  in  the 


32  Planning  the  Campaign 

learning  of  the  lesson,  the  deeper,  the  more 
powerful,  the  more  lasting  the  impression. 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  the  statement  of  the 
teacher's  aim  above  given,  the  word  "  truth  " 

was  used  in  the  singular  num- 
iTssoT^  ^^  ^        ber.     It  must  be  evident  from 

the  foregoing  that  it  is  impos- 
sible to  teach  a  large  number  of  truths  in  a 
single  lesson.  Yet  this  is  what  a  great  many 
teachers  try  to  do.  They  pass  so  quickly 
from  one  truth  to  another  that  not  a  single 
one  of  these  mental  powers  is  brought  prop- 
erly into  play,  much  less  all  of  them.  The 
teacher  who  plans  to  bring  all  or  as  many  of 
them  as  possible  into  action  in  the  teaching 
of  the  lesson  will  find  that  usually  not  more 
than  one  truth  can  be  used.  To  drive  the 
truth  home  through  sensation,  memory,  im- 
agination, feeling  and  reason  to  the  will  is 
not  an  easy  task.  It  takes  careful  study  and 
planning.  How  to  accomplish  this  will  be 
the  subject  of  our  further  study. 


IV 

FACTS  AND  TRUTHS 

BEFORE  we  can  find  out  how  to  lodge 
a  Bible  truth  in  the  mind  of  the  pupil, 
we  must  first  distinguish  between 
Bible  facts  and  Bible  truths.  What  is  meant 
by  a  Bible  fact  ?     What  is  meant  by  a  Bible 

truth  ?     And  what  is  the  con- 
Distinguishing  Be- 
tween Facts  and       nection  between  them  ?     It  is 

to  be  feared  that  many  Sun- 
day-school teachers  have  very  vague  and 
confused  ideas  as  to  the  answers  to  these 
questions.  Yet  they  are  of  the  utmost  im- 
portance. Every  Bible  lesson  contains  cer- 
tain facts,  and  it  also  contains  certain  truths. 
Can  we  study  the  truths  without  studying 
the  facts  ?  Many  teachers  seem  to  have  this 
idea.  In  their  eagerness  to  get  at  the  truths 
of  the  lesson,  they  pass  over  the  facts  as  of 
little  importance.  They  treat  the  lesson  as 
though  the  facts  were  the  shell  of  which  the 
truth  is  the  kernel.  "  Let  us  crack  the  shell 
33 


34  Planning  the  Campaign 

and  throw  it  aside  as  quickly  as  possible  and 
let  us  get  at  the  truth,"  is  their  thought. 

But  such  is  not  the  true  idea  of  the  rela- 
tion between  facts  and  truths  of  the  lesson. 
Rather  should  we  say  that  the 
fo'?ruths°'^''''  fact  is  the  body  of  which  the 
truth  is  the  soul.  There  is  a 
vital  connection  between  them.  As  we  can- 
not see  a  disembodied  spirit  so  we  cannot 
see  a  truth  until  it  is  embodied  in  a  fact. 
When  we  have  once  gained  a  conception  of 
a  living  spirit  through  the  body  which  it  oc- 
cupies, we  can  form  an  idea  of  what  the 
spirit  may  be  when  disembodied ;  and  when 
we  have  once  gotten  hold  of  a  truth 
through  seeing  it  embodied  in  a  fact,  we 
may  form  a  conception  of  that  truth  apart 
from  the  fact.  But  we  can  never  arrive  at  any 
truth  entirely  apart  from  facts  of  some  sort. 
It  is  through  the  study  of  facts  that  we  arrive 
at  a  knowledge  of  truth. 

Just  here  is  a  source  of  weakness  in  Sun- 
day-school teaching.  The  teacher  not  hav- 
ing learned  how  to  discover  the  truth  in  the 
fact  does  not  put  forth  any  mental  effort  to 


Facts  and  Truths  3^ 

discover  the  truths  of  the  lesson  for  herself, 
but  depends  upon  the  lesson  helps  to  point 

them  out  to  her.  Thus  she 
s'^on  Tr'ati?  ''""      "o^  ouly  fails  to  understand  the 

importance  of  the  facts,  but 
she  loses  the  j  oy  of  discovery.  She  does  not 
take  the  interest  in  the  truth  that  she  would 
have  taken  if  she  had  found  it  for  herself. 
She  therefore  lacks  the  power  which  this 
mental  grasp  of  the  truth,  this  interest  in  it, 
and  this  joy  which  its  discovery  would  give 
to  her  if  she  had  worked  it  out  for  herself. 
That  the  study  of  the  facts  is  of  the  greatest 
importance  in  arriving  at  the  truth  will  ap- 
pear from  what  follows. 

All  the  elements  of  our  knowledge  may  be 
divided  into  two  classes,  individual  notions 

and  general  notions.  An  in- 
individuai  Notions    dividual  notion  is  oue  of  which 

we  can  form  a  mental  image. 
It  may  be  derived  from  a  single  sensation  or 
from  a  combination  of  sensations,  or  from  a 
combination  of  present  sensations  and  mem- 
ories of  past  sensations,  or  by  a  combination 
of  memories  of  past  sensations.     It  may  be 


36  Planning  the  Campaign 

simple  or  it  may  be  very  complex.  But  it  is 
always  concrete.  I  have  a  mental  image  of 
the  desk  at  which  I  am  writing,  of  the  friend 
who  is  sitting  by  my  side,  of  Abraham 
Lincoln,  of  Paul  the  apostle,  of  Mt.  Hermon, 
of  the  City  of  Jerusalem,  of  the  crucifixion  of 
Christ.  Material  things,  persons,  incidents 
in  the  lives  of  persons,  places,  events  in 
history — all  things  that  can  be  presented  to 
the  mind  through  the  senses  or  the  imagi- 
nation are  individual  notions. 

A  general  notion  on  the  other  hand  is  one 
that  includes  a  number  of  individual  notions. 
When  a  child  sees  a  horse  for 
General  Notions  the  first  time,  he  forms  an  in- 
dividual notion  of  that  animal. 
After  he  has  seen  a  number  of  horses,  he 
discovers  that  they  all  resemble  each  other 
in  certain  particulars  while  at  the  same  time 
they  differ  from  one  another  in  other  par- 
ticulars. So  he  forms  a  general  notion  of  an 
animal  that  is  not  like  any  particular  horse, 
and  yet,  vague  though  it  may  be,  is  enough 
like  all  horses  to  enable  him  to  use  the  notion 
whenever  he  wishes   to  refer  to  them  as  a 


Facts  and  Truths  37 

class.  This  general  notion  is  always  abstract. 
It  is  impossible  to  form  a  vivid  mental  image 
of  any  general  notion.  Common  nouns,  verbs, 
and  adjectives  that  include  large  numbers  of 
individual  cases,  definitions,  rules,  laws,  prov- 
erbs and  maxims  are  general  notions.  Many 
Bible  texts  contain  such  general  notions. 

The  following  diagram  may  assist  in  mak- 
ing clear  the  relation  between  individual  and 
general  notions.     In  this  dia- 
A  Diagram  gram   cach   one   of  the  large 

triangles    may    represent    an 
individual  notion.     That  portion  of  the  tri- 


angle within  the  small  circle  may  represent 
that  element  which  is   common   to   all   the 


38  Planning  the  Campaign 

individual  notions,  or  the  general  notion. 
Thus  each  large  triangle  might  stand  for  a 
single  instance  of  God's  answer  to  prayer. 
From  the  many  instances  of  such  answers 
given  in  the  Bible  and  from  similar  instances 
in  our  lives,  or  in  the  lives  of  others  whom 
we  have  known,  we  form  the  general  notion 
(or  draw  the  general  inference)  that  God  is 
a  prayer-hearing  and  a  prayer-answering 
God.  The  facts  and  circumstances  con- 
nected with  each  one  of  these  instances  may 
be  entirely  different  from  any  of  the  others. 
Nevertheless,  in  each  group  of  facts,  how- 
ever widely  they  may  differ  in  other  re- 
spects, is  found  this  common  element,  and 
because  we  find  it  present  in  so  many  differ- 
ent instances,  we  are  justified  in  our  faith 
that  when  we  go  to  God  with  our  needs  and 
petitions  He  will  hear  us  and  answer  us  ac- 
cording to  His  infinite  wisdom  and  love. 
The  teacher  who  has  not  studied  psychology 
or  logic  may  find  it  somewhat  difficult  at 
first  to  grasp  these  ideas  of  individual  and 
general  notions.  She  should  make  a  de- 
termined effort  to  do  so  for  they  are  funda- 


Facts  and  Truths  39 

mental   in   all   our  thinking  and  to  all  our 
teaching. 

In  the  Bible  lesson  the  individual  notions 
are  the  facts  of  the  lesson,  all  those  elements 

of  which  we  can  form  mental 
Lesson  Facts  imagcs.     A  large  number  of 

them  may  be  found  in  every 
lesson.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  most 
of  the  Bible  narratives  are  very  much  ab- 
breviated. A  very  short  story  may  often  be 
divided  into  a  number  of  scenes,  and  a  large 
number  of  mental  images  may  be  formed  in 
picturing  each  one  of  these  scenes. 

In  the  story  of  the  conversion  of  Saul,  we 
may  form  a  mental  picture  of  Saul  himself, 

of  the  oriental  costume  that  he 
"LmTcts "  wore,  of  the  horse  on  which  he 

was  riding,  of  the  little  group 
of  companions  who  were  with  him,  of  the 
road  along  which  they  were  riding,  of  the 
desert  stretching  away  to  the  East,  of  the 
dim  line  of  the  hills  to  the  west,  and  of  the 
city  of  Damascus  which  he  saw  before  him. 
We  can  form  mental  images  of  his  state  of 
mind,  see  the  memories  which  were  haunting 


40  Planning  the  Campaign 

him  of  the  death  of  Stephen,  of  the  scenes 
of  suffering  and  sorrow  among  the  Christians 
whom  he  had  arrested  and  dragged  to 
prison ;  we  can  feel  in  imagination  the  sharp 
stings  of  conscience,  the  dark  shadows  of 
doubt  that  hung  over  him ;  we  can  form 
mental  images  of  the  great  light  that  shone 
around  him ;  see  him  fall  to  the  ground  as 
though  struck  by  lightning  ;  hear  that  voice 
as  *'  the  sound  of  many  waters "  saying, 
"  Saul,  Saul,  why  persecutest  thou  Me  ? " 
hear  the  trembling  voice  of  the  stricken  man 
say,  "Who  art  Thou,  Lord?"  and  the  Master's 
reply,  "  I  am  Jesus  whom  thou  persecutest, 
but  arise  and  enter  into  the  city,  and  it  shall 
be  told  thee  what  thou  must  do."  Yet  all  of 
this  and  more  is  comprised  in  four  short 
verses  of  Scripture.' 

When  we  thus  study  the  facts  of  Scripture, 
we  discover  that  while  there  is  a  large  ele- 
ment in  them  which  belongs 
Lesson  Truths         to  a  particular  time  and  place, 
there  is  another  element  which 
is  common  to  these  facts  and  many  others, 

1  Acts  ix.  3-6. 


Facts  and  Truths  41 

which  is  found  in  the  facts  relating  to  other 
persons,  times  and  places.  As  we  study  the 
conversion  of  Saul  we  discover  an  element 
common  to  the  experience  of  a  vast  number 
of  persons  in  all  ages :  It  is  that  wonderful 
grace  of  God,  who  while  Paul  was  a  sinner 
met  him,  revealed  Himself  to  him,  forgave 
him  his  sins,  and  called  him  into  a  life  of 
service  which  filled  him  with  ever-increasing 
joy  and  gladness.  Paul  is  but  one  of  millions 
who  have  thus  experienced  this  wonderful 
grace  of  God.  It  is  this  universal  element 
in  every  Bible  lesson  that  we  are  to  seek 
for,  but  we  find  it  only  by  a  study  of  the 
facts. 

So  contrasting  the  facts  and  the  truths  of 
the  lesson,  we  may  say  that  the  facts  are 
those  elements  which  are  particular,  local 
and  temporal,  while  the  truths  are  those 
elements  which  are  general,  universal  and 
eternal.  The  facts  belong  to  the  particular 
time,  place  and  person,  the  truths  apply  to  all 
places,  times  and  persons. 


V 

THE  FIRST  ADVANCE 

IN  picturing  the  mind  as  a  series  of  ram- 
parts, sensation  was  mentioned  as  the 
first  or  outer  one.     The  capture  of  this 
rampart  need  not  detain  us  long  or  be  con- 
sidered as  a  separate  step  in  the  teaching 
process  for  several   reasons : 
Memory  (i)     It  may  be  truly  said  that 

the  gates  through  this  rampart 
lie  wide  open  and  undefended.  They  are  so 
easily  taken,  that  they  are  often  a  hindrance 
rather  than  a  help  in  teaching.  (2)  As  the 
Bible  lesson  facts  relate  to  events  which  hap- 
pened long  ago,  in  a  far  distant  land,  the 
senses  cannot  be  used  directly,  but  only  in- 
directly in  the  illustration  of  the  lesson. 
(3)  In  the  actual  process  of  teaching,  or- 
dinarily the  first  rampart  to  be  attacked  is 
the  memory.  Why  this  is  so  will  appear 
from  the  following  account  of  the  process  of 

acquiring  new  individual  notions. 

42 


The  First  Advance  43 

A  little  child  who  had  a  pet  dog  was  taken 
into  the  country  and  saw  a  sheep  for  the  first 
time.  He  cried  out,  "  Oh, 
■"r.r.>*Nr:=  •"ama,  see  the  funny  dog." 
The  mother  laughed  at  the 
mistake  and  told  him  that  was  not  a  dog  but 
a  sheep.  What  took  place  in  that  child's 
mind  ?  A  new  object  was  presented  to  it. 
There  was  already  in  his  mind  a  familiar 
image  of  his  dog.  He  recalled  this  image, 
compared  it  with  the  new  object  presented  to 
his  senses,  saw  a  resemblance  between  them, 
and  named  the  new  object  a  "  dog."  At  the 
same  time,  he  saw  that  the  new  object  differed 
from  the  image  in  his  mind,  and  so  he  called 
it  "a  funny  dog."  Then  the  mother  told 
him  the  name  of  the  new  object,  a  sheep. 
So  he  acquired  a  new  individual  notion. 

Thus  all  learning  is  a  process  of  compari- 
son between  the  old  and  the  new.  Not  only 
so,  but  there  must  be  some  re- 
Apperception  semblance,  connection  or  rela- 
tion between  the  old  and  the 
new.  The  closer  the  kinship  between  them 
the  easier  is  the  new  added  to  the  old.     The 


44  Planning  the  Campaign 

greater  the  difference  between  them,  the  more 
mental  effort  is  required  to  compare  them, 
and  to  form  the  notion  of  the  new.  The 
mind  welcomes  the  familiar  but  shrinks  from 
the  strange  and  unfamiliar. 

A  new  idea  presented  to  the  mind  is  like  a 
person  entering  a  room  full  of  people.     If  he 

is  an  entire  stranger,  he  and 
Illustration  evcry  one  else  present  feels  a 

sense  of  embarrassment,  and 
he  has  a  strong  impulse  to  withdraw.  If 
there  is  one  person  in  the  room  who  is  ac- 
quainted with  him,  that  person  welcomes 
him.  But  if  every  one  in  the  room  knows 
him  well,  neither  they  nor  he  feel  any  embar- 
rassment, he  is  gladly  welcomed,  and  finds 
his  place  readily  among  them.  So  when  the 
new  idea  comes  into  the  mind,  if  there  is 
a  close  relationship  between  it  and  other 
ideas  in  the  mind,  the  new  idea  feels  at  home, 
as  it  were,  and  takes  its  place  among  its 
kindred.  But  if  the  ideas  already  there  have 
no  connection  with  the  new  idea,  there  is  a 
feeling  of  strangeness,  and  it  is  either  treated 
with  indifference  or  is  rejected  altogether. 


The  First  Advance  45 

This  is  a  simple  illustration  of  the  great 
law  of  the  mind  which  psychologists  call  the 
law  of  apperception.  We  learn  with  what 
we  know.  Out  of  the  immense  number  of 
mental  impressions  coming  into  the  mind 
through  the  senses  and  the  imagination,  it 
selects  only  those  which  have  some  kinship 
with  its  previously  acquired  stock  of  ideas. 
To  these  it  attends,  from  the  others  it  turns 
away. 

But  not  only  does  the  reception  of  new 
ideas  depend  upon  their  connection  with 
those  already  possessed.  It 
r;;s^o:u  B.'""  also  depends  largely  upon 
where  those  ideas  are  in  the 
mind.  If  the  old  ideas  are  buried  deep  in  the 
subconscious  mind,  time  and  effort  to  bring 
them  into  consciousness  is  necessary  before 
the  comparison  can  be  made.  If,  however, 
the  old  ideas  are  actually  in  the  conscious- 
ness at  the  time  the  new  idea  is  presented, 
then  the  comparison  is  quickly  and  easily 
made. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  the  contents  of 
the  pupil's  consciousness  at  the  beginning  of 


46  Planning  the  Campaign 

the  lesson  must  greatly  influence  its  recep- 
tion.    If,  for  example,  the  pupil  just  before 

coming  to  class  had  been 
Z'ZtT'°'     thinking    on    the    subject  of 

prayer,  and  had  been  debat- 
ing whether  or  not  he  could  really  expect  God 
to  answer  his  prayers  and  were  to  come  to  the 
class  with  these  thoughts  in  his  mind,  and 
the  teacher  were  to  begin  to  teach  the  lesson 
on  the  deliverance  of  Peter  from  prison,' 
and  how  wonderfully  the  prayers  of  the 
church  were  answered,  the  mind  of  the  pupil 
would  eagerly  seize  upon  it.  But  if  the 
pupil  comes  to  the  class  with  his  conscious- 
ness filled  with  the  experiences  of  the  past 
week,  the  latest  newspaper  sensation,  yester- 
day's ball  game,  the  story  book  that  he  is 
reading,  or  a  thousand  and  one  other  things 
that  have  no  connection  whatever  with  the 
lesson  for  the  day,  then  there  must  be  some 
preliminary  preparation  of  his  mind  before 
he  can  receive  the  lesson.  The  ideas  which 
are  alien  to  it  must  be  driven  out ;  facts, 
truths    and     experiences    which     do     have 

•  Acts  xii.  3-19. 


The  First  Advance  47 

some  relation  to  it  must  be  recalled  to  his 
mind. 

The  first  step  in  the  teaching  process  is  then 
to  prepare  the  mind  of  the  pupil  by  bringing 
into  his  consciousness  ideas  which  are  re- 
lated to  those  contained  in  the  lesson.  In  so 
doing  the  first  advance  is  made  upon  the 
memory. 

But  how  is  the  teacher  to  know  what  is  in 
the  mind  of  the  pupil  ?  Of  course  if  the  pu- 
pil has  studied  the  lesson  be- 
PupT/Mind'^'^  fore  coming  to  the  class,  he 
already  has  some  ideas  con- 
cerning it  to  which  others  are  easily  added. 
But  suppose,  as  is  so  often  the  case,  he  has 
not  studied  the  lesson  ?  Then  the  teacher  in 
planning  her  approach  must  fall  back  upon 
her  knowledge  of  the  pupil  and  his  mind. 
This  she  acquires  by  studying  his  home  life, 
his  school  life,  his  recreations,  his  compan- 
ions, his  reading,  etc.  The  more  she  knows 
about  these  the  easier  it  will  be  to  find  the 
point  of  contact  with  his  present  knowledge. 

Again  the  teacher  knows  what  she  has  al- 
ready  taught    her   class.     She    should    not 


48  Planning  the  Campaign 

think  that  she  is  done  with  a  lesson  when  she 
has  taught  it  once.     It  is  to  be  feared  that 

many  teachers  dismiss  the  les- 
Former  Lessons       sons  from  their  minds  almost 

as  completely  as  the  pupil 
often  does.  But  the  skillful  teacher  will  keep 
a  record  of  the  lessons  taught,  and  one  of 
her  first  questions  in  planning  her  approach 
should  be,  Can  I  use  any  previous  lesson  to 
lead  up  to  this  one  ?  If  there  is  a  close  con- 
nection between  the  last  lesson  and  this  one, 
then  a  brief  review  is  a  fine  preparation  for 
the  new  one.  But  if  as  so  often  happens 
there  is  but  little  connection  between  them, 
then  the  teacher  may  go  back  over  the  les- 
sons previously  taught,  until  she  finds  one 
that  is  closely  related  to,  or  resembles  in  its 
facts  or  truths,  the  one  for  the  day.  For  ex- 
ample, if  the  teacher  had  taught  a  year  ago 
the  incident  of  Hezekiah's  prayer,  in  the 
twentieth  chapter  of  2  Kings,  and  the  story 
for  the  day  is  that  of  the  deliverance  of  Peter 
from  prison,  the  teacher  by  recalling  the  les- 
son on  Hezekiah  would  accomplish  two  de- 
sirable objects,  she  would  refresh  the  mem- 


The  First  Advance  49 

ory  of  the  pupil  and  lead  up  easily  to  the 
lesson  for  the  day.  Much  more  of  such  work 
in  linking  passages  of  Scripture  together 
might  be  done  by  teachers,  and  thus  the  pu- 
pil's knowledge  would  be  rendered  more  ra- 
tional and  systematic,  and  because  of  the  as- 
sociations thus  formed,  would  be  more  easily 
recalled. 

Jesus  makes  constant  use  in  His  teaching 

of  the  law  that  we  are  now  considering.     In 

His  conversation  with  the  Sa- 

Illustration 

The  Samaritan         maritau  woman,  He  takes  the 

Woman 

well  of  water  with  which  she 
was  so  familiar  as  the  starting  point  for  His 
great  teaching  on  the  water  of  life.  The  par- 
able of  the  sower  is  based  upon  familiar 
scenes  in  the  minds  of  His  audience.  It  has 
been  suggested  that  when  Jesus  spoke  this 
parable  on  the  shore  of  the  Lake  of  Gal- 
ilee, He  could  look  over  the  heads  of  His 
audience  and  see  a  sower  at  his  work  on 
the  hillside.  His  reference  to  the  wind  in 
the  talk  with  Nicodemus,  to  the  bread  in  the 
sixth  chapter  of  John,  to  the  light  in  the 
eighth  chapter  of  John ;  the  parables  of  the 


^o  Planning  the  Campaign 

lost  sheep,  the  lost  coin,  and  the  prodigal 
son.  His  constant  reference  to  the  kingdom 
of  heaven — in  fact  all  of  His  teaching  is 
rooted  in  the  familiar  scenes,  experiences  and 
thoughts  of  the  people  to  whom  He  spoke. 

So  the  sermon  in  the  second  chapter  of 

Acts  is  an  admirable  example  of  the  use  of 

this  principle,  beginning  as  it 

Illustration  ^  ^  ^  ^ 

Peter's  Sermon,       docs  with  the  familiar  proph- 

Acts  ii 

ecy  and  leading  up  to  the 
great  truths  concerning  Jesus  and  the  resur- 
rection. 

The  address  of  Paul  in  the  synagogue  of 
Antioch  in  Pisidia  in  the  thirteenth  chapter 

of  Acts  is  another  good  ex- 
uoTpIT  ample  of  the  use  of  the  law  of 

apperception.  Paul  did  not 
begin  his  address  by  telling  about  Jesus. 
His  audience  had  probably  never  heard  of 
Him,  and  if  Paul  had  begun  immediately  to 
talk  about  Jesus,  they  would  not  have  under 
stood  him,  and  perhaps  would  not  have 
given  him  their  attention.  But  most  of  these 
people  were  Jews  and  Paul  began  by  re- 
calling to  their  minds  some   of  the  facts  of 


The  First  Advance  51 

their  national  history  down  to  the  time  of 
David,  and  when  he  had  reached  that,  he 
found  the  point  of  contact  in  the  promise  of 
God  to  David  and  declared  to  them  "  in  this 
man's  seed  God  hath  brought  unto  Israel  a 
Saviour,  Jesus."  Then  he  tells  the  story  of 
the  crucifixion  and  the  resurrection,  and  pro- 
claims the  remission  of  sins  through  Christ's 
name. 

In  planning  the  approach  the  teacher  may 
use  either  facts  or  truths  previously  learned. 

In  looking  over  former  lessons 
"'Trufhf "  ^^'''   resemblances    may   often    be 

found  between  the  facts  of 
such  lessons  and  those  of  the  lesson  for  the 
day.  Sometimes  resemblances  may  not  be 
apparent  at  first,  but  may  be  discovered 
when  two  or  more  lessons  are  placed  along 
side  of  each  other.  A  Bible  class  teacher  be- 
gan the  study  of  the  deliverance  of  Paul  from 
the  jail  at  Philippi  by  referring  briefly  to  the 
prison  experiences  of  Joseph,  Jeremiah,  John 
the  Baptist  and  Peter,  and  the  different  ways 
in  which  God  had  delivered  them.  At  first 
thought   there  might  not  seem  to  be  much 


52  Planning  the  Campaign 

likeness  between  the  experiences  of  the  Syro- 
Phcenician  woman,  the  widow  of  Nain,  the 
nobleman  of  Capernaum,  Jairus,  and  the 
father  of  the  boy  at  the  foot  of  the  Mount  of 
Transfiguration,  but  when  they  are  brought 
side  by  side  how  deep  and  real  are  their  re- 
semblances !  So  the  different  ways  in  which 
God  calls  men  might  be  shown  by  reference 
to  Abraham,  Moses,  Samuel,  David,  Isaiah 
and  Paul. 

Sometimes     striking     contrasts    may    be 
noticed  between  the  facts  of  former  lessons 
and  those  of  the  lesson  for  the 
Contrasts  day.     How  different   the   ex- 

perience of  John  the  Baptist 
and  that  of  Peter  in  prison ;  note  the  contrast 
between  Matthew  and  the  rich  young  noble- 
man ;  how  different  the  experiences  of  Isaiah 
and  Jeremiah,  both  prophets  of  the  Lord ; 
notice  the  differences  in  the  story  of  the  con- 
version of  the  Ethiopian  eunuch  and  of 
Cornelius ;  notice  the  striking  contrasts  be- 
tween the  impotent  man  at  the  Pool  of 
Bethesda  in  the  fifth  chapter  of  John,  and  the 
blind  man  in  the  ninth  chapter  of  that  Gospel. 


The  First  Advance  53 

Sometimes  the  teacher  may  recall  illustra- 
tions previously  used  by  her  which  contain 

facts  resembling  or  contrast- 
fratl^ns'"""  '^^S  wlth  thosc  of  the  lesson. 

Facts  concerning  the  persecu- 
tions of  Christians,  remarkable  answers  to 
prayer,  conversions,  signal  deliverances  from 
danger,  and  other  religious  experiences  that 
have  come  within  the  knowledge  of  the  pupil 
or  the  teacher,  may  in  some  particulars  con- 
tain resemblances  or  contrasts  to  the  facts  of 
the  lesson.  So  the  watchful  teacher  may 
often  pick  up  incidents  from  newspapers  and 
magazines  in  which  there  are  facts  which  re- 
semble those  found  in  the  Bible. 

On  the  other  hand  the  facts  of  the  lesson 
may  teach  a  truth  which  has  been  taught  in 

previous    lessons    where    the 

Taught'''''''""''''  ^^^^^  ^^^^  entirely  different. 
Almost  any  great  religious 
truth  may  be  illustrated  by  a  variety  of  human 
experiences.  The  teacher  may  begin  the  les- 
son by  recalling  a  truth  taught  in  a  previous 
one,  and  then  proceed  to  point  out  how  the 
same  truth  is  found  in  the  facts  of  the  lesson 


54  Planning  the  Campaign 

for  the  day.  Thus  the  familiar  truth  clothed 
with  fresh  concrete  facts  takes  on  a  new  and 
deeper  meaning.  The  mind  of  the  pupil  de- 
lights in  the  discovery  of  a  new  aspect  to  an 
old,  familiar  truth.  A  truth  which  repeated 
many  times  in  an  abstract  form  would  make 
but  little  impression,  when  thus  illustrated  by 
new  and  widely  differing  facts  and  experi- 
ences, is  driven  home  deeper  into  the  mind 
and  life.  It  is  one  of  the  elements  of  good 
teaching  thus  to  enforce  the  same  truth  by 
new  and  fresh  concrete  facts.  And  let  it  be 
repeated  again  that  in  thus  pointing  out  re- 
semblances and  differences,  the  teacher  is 
making  use  of  the  law  of  association  by  which 
knowledge  is  fixed  in  the  memory,  is  exercis- 
ing the  reasoning  powers  of  the  pupil  by  as- 
sisting him  to  classify  and  arrange  his  knowl- 
edge, and  is  aiding  him  to  build  up  an  orderly 
system  of  truth.  The  teacher  who  keeps  con- 
stantly running  over  in  her  mind  the  lessons 
previously  taught  for  the  purpose  of  compari- 
son and  distinction  will  soon  become  expert  in 
detecting  resemblances  and  differences  which 
may  thus  be  used  in  connecting  the  lessons. 


VI 

THE  IMPORTANCE  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

HAVING  carried  the  rampart  of  mem- 
ory and  prepared  the  mind  of  the 
pupil  by  recalling  facts  and  truths 
with  which  he  is  familiar  and  which  are  re- 
lated to  those  of  the  lesson,  the  teacher  is 
now  ready  to  advance  upon  and  carry  the 
next  rampart  which  is  the  imagination.  As 
it  is  from  the  lesson  facts  that  we  derive  the 
lesson  truths,  the  facts  must  be  studied  first, 
and  it  is  in  the  teaching  of  the  lesson  facts 
that  this  attack  must  be  made. 

In  describing  an  individual  notion  it  was 
said  that  it  is  one  of  which  a  mental  image 
can   be   formed   and    that    it 
.'T.-L'Nt.rf;    may   be  derived   from   (i)  a 
single  sensation,  (2)  a  combi- 
nation  of  sensations,    (3)   a  combination  of 
present   sensations   and    memories    of    past 
sensations,  or  (4)  a  combination  of  memories 
of  past  sensations.     As  we  have  seen  Bible 
55 


56       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

facts  relate  to  events  which  happened  in  far- 
away countries,  a  long  time  ago,  and  cannot 
be  presented  directly  to  the  senses.  But  the 
mind  has  another  most  wonderful  power  by 
which  it  may  form  notions  of  such  facts  and 
that  is  the  power  of  imagination.  In  form- 
ing notions  of  persons,  places  and  events 
which  have  never  been  present  to  the  senses, 
the  imagination  draws  upon  images  of  past 
sense  impressions  stored  in  the  memory. 
With  these  in  whole  or  in  part,  and  with 
such  aids  as  it  may  have  given  to  it  by  de- 
scriptions and  comparisons,  it  constructs  a 
new  mental  image  or  picture  which  may  in  a 
greater  or  less  degree  resemble  the  actual 
place,  person  or  event. 

The   use   of  the   imagination  is  so  much 
neglected    in    Sunday-school   teaching  that 

we  deem  it  necessary  here 
DewTy  °''^""         to    quote  from  a  few  of  our 

leading  educators  upon  the 
subject.  Dr.  John  Dewey  says :  "  The 
mental  image  is  the  great  instrument  of 
instruction.  What  a  child  gets  out  of  any 
subject    presented    to    him    is    simply    the 


The  Importance  of  the  Imagination     57 

images  which  he  himself  forms  with  regard 
to  it.  I  beheve  that  if  nine-tenths  of  the 
energy  at  present  directed  towards  making 
children  learn  certain  things  were  spent  in 
seeing  to  it  that  the  child  was  forming  proper 
images,  the  work  of  instruction  would  be 
indefinitely  facilitated.  I  believe  that  much 
of  the  time  and  attention  now  given  to  the 
preparation  and  presentation  of  lessons 
might  be  more  wdsely  and  profitably  ex- 
pended in  training  a  child's  power  of 
imagery  and  in  seeing  to  it  that  he  was 
continually  forming  definite,  vivid  and  grow- 
ing images  of  the  various  subjects  with  which 
he  comes  in  contact  in  his  experience."  ^ 

Patterson  Du  Bois  in  his  fine  book  on  "  The 
Natural  Way  in  Moral  Training,"  says : 
"  Chief  among  these  indirect 
Patterson  Du  Bois  modes  of  sccuring  thosc  right 
habits  of  action  and  thought 
which  beget  right  feelings  is  the  setting 
before  the  mind  a  worthy  image,  a  living 
deed  or  picture.  .  .  .  Nothing  is  so  per- 
sistent in  the  memory  as  an  image,  nothing 

1  «  My  Pedagogic  Creed,"  p.  14. 


58        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

so  controls  ideals.  .  .  .  The  writer  who 
lives  writes  in  pictures.  Many  a  dull  speech 
or  sermon  is  redeemed  by  one  well  told  story 
or  even  a  vivid  rhetorical  figure.  Fable, 
parable  and  allegory,  at  their  best,  penetrate 
the  deepest  and  stick  the  longest.  That 
prince  of  educators,  Francis  W.  Parker,  said 
that  attention  was  imaging.  Words  and 
phrase  expressions  are  functioned  only  when 
they  are  followed  by  a  mental  image.  There 
is  no  real  teaching  through  dead  forms  of 
words  which,  because  they  call  up  no  image, 
do  not  function." 

Mr.   Du  Bois  quotes  Dr.  George  Stanley 
Hall  as  saying :  "  Again  we  tend  to  think 

in  images,  and  some  phi- 
George  Stanley        losophcrs   like   Tainc,    Frosc- 

hammer  and  Parrish,  have 
represented  that  this  is  the  form  of  about 
all  human  thought.  However  this  may  be, 
the  imagination  is  one  of  the  most  potent 
of  all  human  faculties  and  is  more  creative 
than  any  other.  Some  high  authorities  have 
lately  urged  that  if  this  faculty  were  well 
trained,  all  the  rest  would  almost  take  care 


The  Importance  of  the  Imagination     59 

of  themselves.  By  the  imagination  we 
escape  from  the  limits  of  time,  space  and 
even  all  personality  that  hedge  us  in  ;  our 
lives  may  be  ever  so  limited  and  yet  by  this 
power  we  can  almost  become  citizens  of  all 
time  and  spectators  of  all  events.  By  it  the 
poet,  artist  and  prophet  have  wrought  their 
magic  in  the  world."  ^ 

Horace  Bushnell  declared  that  the  Gospel 
Horace  Bushnell      was  a  gift  to  thc  imagination. 

Our  Saviour  in  His  teaching  makes  a  con- 
stant appeal  to  the  imagination.  His  par- 
ables are  little  pictures  painted 
il\l"at":'*"'  with  a  few  touches,  but  with 
such  a  master  hand  that  once 
seen,  they  are  hung  up  in  the  memory  never 
to  be  forgotten.  We  quote  again  from  Mr. 
Du  Bois :  '*  Nothing  is  more  marked  in  the 
teaching  of  Jesus  than  its  pictorial  visibility. 
Sometimes  it  was  acted,  as  in  the  miracles, 
the  washing  of  the  disciples'  feet,  the  'show 
me  a  penny,'  the  setting  of  the  child  in  the 
midst,  the  blessing  of  little  children,  the 
cursing  of  the  barren  fig  tree,  etc.     Some- 

'  Op.  cit.,  pp.  179,  191,  219. 


6o       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

times  it  was  given  in  vivid  word  picture  or 
story  as  in  the  parables ;  or  in  visual  illustra- 
tion as  the  smitten  cheek,  the  stolen  coat,  the 
two  women  grinding  at  the  mill,  the  widow's 
mite,  the  Good  Samaritan,  the  last  supper, 
etc.  Wendt  observes  that  '  the  whole  active 
work  of  Jesus  was  an  exposition  of  His  teach- 
ing through  His  own  example.'  He  made  it 
visible  in  His  own  life.  Then  He  abounded 
in  simile  and  metaphor  and  figurative  illus- 
trations by  comparison ;  in  parables  involving 
comparison  utilizing  common  things ;  in  al- 
legories. In  fact  the  incarnation  itself  is,  as 
it  were,  a  divine  announcement  of  this  prin- 
ciple. Men  needed  to  see  the  ideal  man  in  the 
real ;  they  needed  the  image  of  the  actual,  of 
perfect  manhood  in  the  concrete,  in  order  that 
they  should  themselves  know  God  better." 

One  of  the  secrets  of  Christ's  wonderful 
power  as  a  teacher  is  just  this  skill  in  seizing 
and  holding  up  before  the  mind  some  concrete 
fact  or  group  of  facts  which  can  easily  be 
grasped  by  the  imagination  and  at  the  heart 
of  which  lies  a  great  spiritual  truth. 


VII 

GENERAL  PREPARATION 

AS    individual    notions   or   the   lesson 
facts  in  Bible  study  are  grasped  by 
the  imagination,  and  as  we  arrive  at 
a  knowledge  of  general  truths  through  the 
study  of  individual  facts,  we  see  how  abso- 
lutely essential  it  is  that  the 
lll^ZtT         teacher  should  plan  to  attack 
and  carry  this  rampart  in  the 
pupil's   mind.     But   before   the  teacher  can 
bring  the  facts  vividly  before  the  imagination 
of  the  pupil,  she  must  have  them  vividly  and 
distinctly  before  her  own  imagination.     She 
cannot  make  the  pupil  see  what  she  does  not 
see  herself. 

Here  is  where  many  Sunday-school  teach- 
ers fail.  For  this  failure  there  are  several 
causes:  (i)  Teachers  have  been  taught 
that  the  important  thing  in  the  lesson  is  the 

lesson  truth  ;  (2)  they  have  never  made  any 
61 


62        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

attempt  to  cultivate  their  imaginations ;  (3) 
they  have  gotten  into  the  habit  of  thinking 

in  words  rather  than  in  pic- 
causes  of  Failure      turcs  ;  (4)  it  takcs  Considerable 

effort  to  get  the  lesson  facts 
vividly  before  the  imagination  ;  (5)  the  les- 
son helps  in  constant  use  by  teachers  give 
little  assistance  in  developing  the  facts  con- 
cretely and  vividly,  but  are  largely  taken  up 
with  critical  notes,  homiletical  applications, 
etc.  (6)  Then,  too,  many  teachers  have  not 
had  the  opportunity  to  study  psychology, 
and  to  learn  either  of  the  importance  of  the 
imagination  or  how  to  cultivate  it.  In  view 
of  its  great  importance  then,  and  of  the  facts 
just  pointed  out,  we  will  be  pardoned  for 
giving  considerable  space  to  the  study  of 
this  subject. 

There  are  several  elements  that  go  to  the 
making  of  a  good  imagination.     There  must 

be  (i)  a  store  of  past  mental 
imagStiol'  °°°'    impressions  which  may  furnish 

the  material  for  the  new  pic- 
ture ;  (2)  power  to  recall  such  past  mental 
impressions  ;  (3)  power   to   recombine   such 


General  Preparation  63 

memories  into  a  new  mental  product ; 
(4)  power,  when  such  memories  are  thus  re- 
called and  recombined,  to  see  the  new  pic- 
ture vividly  and  distinctly ;  and  (5)  power  to 
do  all  this  easily  and  rapidly.  It  will  be  well 
for  the  teacher  to  study  her  own  imagination 
and  see  in  which  one,  if  any,  of  these  ele- 
ments it  is  weak. 

It  will  usually  be  found  that  the  principal 
cause  for  a  poor  imagination  is  the  lack  of 

sense  material  from  which  to 
Sense  Material         draw,     No  mental  image  can 

be  formed  of  anything  which 
does  not  resemble  something  that  has  been 
presented  to  the  senses.  A  blind  man  can- 
not imagine  the  colour  of  yellow.  A  child 
born  and  raised  upon  the  great  plains  can 
form  no  vivid  picture  of  a  lofty  mountain 
peak.  The  dweller  in  the  tropics  cannot 
imagine  what  ice  is  like.  One  who  has  been 
raised  in  a  great  city  cannot  form  vivid  pic- 
tures of  country  life,  while  he  who  has  lived 
in  the  country  finds  it  extremely  difficult  to 
realize  the  life  of  the  dweller  in  the  city.  In 
reading  poetry  or  fiction,  we  constantly  draw 


64       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

upon  familiar  scenes  of  our  own  past  life,  and 
with  these,  often  with  but  very  slight  change, 
we  form  the  background  of  the  various  scenes 
depicted. 

Even  where  there  may  be  a  fund  of  mate- 
rial  upon  which   to   draw,  the   imagination 

may  be  poor  because  of  lack 
Neglect  of  Memory   of   practicc  iu   recalling  past 

sense  impressions.  It  may  be 
said  that  ninety  per  cent,  of  imagination  is 
memory.  Immense  numbers  of  sense  im- 
pressions are  made  upon  the  mind  through 
the  senses  that  are  never  recalled.  Seldom 
do  we  make  deliberate  effort  to  recall  them. 
The  varying  experiences  of  our  daily  lives 
pass  quickly  into  oblivion.  It  is  hard  to  re- 
call what  we  did  or  what  happened  to  us  last 
week,  last  month,  last  year.  Most  of  us  give 
litde  time  to  the  effort  to  recall  these  experi- 
ences. Thus  the  memory  becomes  weak  from 
lack  of  use. 

A  third  cause  of  a  poor  imagination  is  a 
lack  of  power  to  visualize,  that  is,  to  see  the 
image  distinctly  when  recalled.  In  Prof. 
William     James'     larger    work     on     "  Psy- 


General  Preparation  65 

chology  "  there  is  an  account  of  an  investiga- 
tion which  was  conducted  by  Professor  Galton 
as  to  tiie  visualizing  power  of 
fn?estitions  different    persons.      Professor 

Galton  sent  out  to  a  large 
number  of  people  a  list  of  questions  as  fol- 
lows : 

Picture  to  yourself  your  breakfast  table  as 
it  looked  this  morning.  Now  answer  the  fol- 
lowing questions : 

(i)  Illumination.  Is  the  image  dim  or 
fairly  clear  ?  Is  its  brightness  comparable  to 
the  actual  scene  ? 

(2)  Definition.  Are  all  the  objects  pretty 
well  defined  at  the  same  time,  or  is  the  place 
of  sharpest  definition  at  any  one  moment 
more  contracted  than  the  real  scene? 

(3)  Colouring.  Are  the  colours  of  the 
china,  of  the  toast,  bread  crust,  mustard, 
meat,  parsley,  or  whatever  may  have  been  on 
the  table  quite  distinct  and  natural  ? 

Professor  Galton  found  that  many  scientific 
men  had  no  mental  imagery  whatever.  In 
general  society  he  found  many  men  and  a 
larger  number  of  women  and  many  boys  and 


66       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

girls  vv'ho  declared  that  they  habitually  saw 
mental  imagery  and  that  it  was  perfectly  dis- 
tinct, full  and  clear.  They  could  describe 
their  imagery  in  minute  detail. 

Let   the   teacher   try   this   experiment   on 

herself  and  endeavour  to  discover  how  much 

visualizing    power    she    pos- 

vllua'JrrrpLer       SCSSCS.       No    doubt    UpOU  SUCh 

a  test  many  will  find  that  the 
power  is  weak.  But  this  weakness  may 
arise  simply  from  lack  of  exercise  as  in  the 
case  of  the  scientific  men  referred  to  by 
Professor  Galton.  If  this  is  so  it  may  readily 
be  regained  and  may  be  greatly  strengthened 
and  brought  to  a  high  degree  of  efficiency 
by  practice.  Let  the  teacher  practice  re- 
calling the  scenes  of  her  childhood,  the 
places  she  has  visited,  the  persons  she  has 
met,  the  pictures  she  has  seen.  In  doing 
this  let  her  take  time  to  permit  the  pictures 
to  form,  for  they  may  come  slowly  at  first. 
It  is  a  good  plan  to  look  at  a  picture  or  a 
scene  steadily  for  some  moments  and  then 
close  the  eyes  and  try  to  see  it  in  the  mind. 
Then   opening  the    eyes  again   the    actual 


General  Preparation  67 

picture  may  be  compared  with  the  mental 
picture,  repeating  this  until  the  one  is  a 
vivid  reproduction  of  the  other.  After  a 
little  practice  the  teacher  will  find  the  visual- 
izing power  growing  stronger  and  working 
more  rapidly. 

The  teacher  may  have  a   good   memory 
and  strong  visualizing  power,  and  yet  may 

not  be  able  to  construct  new 
Sres  ""'''*'"     mental  pictures.     This  faculty 

too  is  developed  by  exercise. 
The  teacher  in  reading  newspapers,  maga- 
zines and  books,  should  stop  frequently, 
close  the  eyes,  and  strive  to  form  a  vivid 
picture  of  the  scene  and  of  the  persons  about 
whom  she  has  just  been  reading.  At  first  it 
will  probably  be  found  that  these  pictures 
are  exceedingly  vague  and  indistinct.  Very 
few  people  take  time  in  reading  to  form 
distinct  pictures  in  the  mind  of  the  scenes 
about  which  they  are  reading.  We  are  most 
of  us  content  to  skim  from  page  to  page, 
rapidly,  without  taking  time  to  allow  images 
to  form,  except  in  a  most  vague  and  indis- 
tinct   manner.     The   truth  is  that  very  few 


68        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

people  have  "  snap  shot "  imaginations.  With 
most  of  us  it  takes  a  "  time  exposure  "  to  al- 
low the  picture  to  form  on  the  mental  plate. 
If  there  were  some  way  by  which  we  could 
see  these  mental  pictures  as  we  can  see  im- 
perfect photographic  plates,  we  would  be 
amazed  to  see  how  poor  our  snap  shot  pic- 
tures are. 

Power  to  see  these  new  pictures  vividly  as 

well  as  to  use  the  imagination  with  ease  and 

rapidity  will  come  with  prac- 

Practicc  tice   and   cultivation    of    this 

wonderful  faculty  of  the  mind. 

As  a  rule  children  have  strong  memories 
and  vivid  imaginations.  They  think  in  pic- 
tures. Most  Sunday-school  teachers,  no 
doubt,  had  vivid  imaginations  when  they 
were  young.  But  as  they  grow  older  the 
reasoning  powers  develop  ;  they  form  large 
numbers  of  general  notions,  and  get  into  the 
habit  of  thinking  in  words,  in  abstract  terms. 
Thus  the  imagination  becomes  weak  simply 
from  lack  of  exercise. 

Where  the  proper  use  of  the  imagination 
has  been  neglected  it  will  take  considerable 


General  Preparation  69 

mental  effort  to  carry  out  the  foregoing  sug- 
gestions for  its  improvement,  but  the  teacher 

who  will  give  the  time  and  en- 
I'l^Tnatio?''        ergy  necessary  to  cultivate  the 

imagination  in  this  manner, 
will  be  amply  repaid  by  the  increased  enjoy- 
ment and  delight  which  she  will  obtain  from 
all  her  reading,  as  well  as  the  new  power  it 
will  give  to  her  in  teaching. 


VIII 

SPECIAL  PREPARATION 

IN  studying  a  portion  of  Bible  history  or 
biography,  the  teacher  should  read  the 
lesson  and  its  context  and  note  carefully 
where  the  story  begins  and  where  it  ends. 
The  lesson  verses  printed  in  the  lesson  helps 
should  be  disregarded.     They 
study  the  complete   ^^^     determined    largely    by 

limitations  of  space,  and  there- 
fore rarely  show  any  regard  for  literary  unity. 
The  writers  of  these  stories  had  a  fine  literary 
sense ;  they  knew  how  to  begin,  how  to 
work  up  to  a  climax,  and  how  to  end  their 
stories.  Even  in  single  paragraphs  and  very 
short  stories  there  is  always  displayed  this 
sense  of  literary  unity.  A  proper  regard  b)^ 
the  teacher  for  this  unity  will  greatly  aid  in 
deepening  the  impression  of  the  lesson  upon 

the  pupil. 

70 


Special  Preparation  71 

In  each  incident  or  story  there  will  usually 
be   found  a  number  of    changes   of  scene. 

The  teacher  should  note  these 
Scenes  and    make    a    list    of    them. 

Sometimes  the  teacher  may 
add  scenes  which  are  not  mentioned  in  the 
story  but  which  lead  up  to  it,  or  which  may 
occur  between  those  mentioned.  Thus  the 
story  of  the  restoring  of  sight  to  the  blind 
man  in  the  ninth  chapter  of  John's  Gospel 
might  be  divided  as  follows :  Scene  i,  The 
blind  man  in  his  home  (not  mentioned) ;  (2) 
the  blind  beggar  by  the  wayside  (before  the 
coming  of  Jesus) ;  (3)  the  coming  of  Jesus ; 
(4)  the  journey  to  the  pool  (his  thoughts  and 
feelings) ;  (5)  at  the  Pool  of  Siloam ;  (6)  the 
journey  from  the  pool  ("came  seeing");  (7) 
the  return  home  (not  mentioned) ;  (8)  the 
discovery  of  the  neighbours  ;  (9)  the  meeting 
with  the  Pharisees;  (10)  the  meeting  with 
Jesus.  Let  it  be  noted  that  each  of  these 
scenes  covered  a  certain  length  of  time  in  the 
life  of  the  blind  man,  and  include  experiences 
which  to  him  were  of  the  deepest  interest 
and  of  the  utmost  importance.     Yet  so  con- 


72        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

densed  is  the  narrative  that  some  of  them  are 
included  in  but  a  word  or  two.  Think  of 
how  much  is  included  in  those  four  words 
**  blind  from  his  birth  "  ;  think  of  the  joy  of 
that  return  journe}^  "and  came  seeing." 
The  teacher  who  would  enter  into  this  story 
must  with  the  aid  of  her  imagination  fill  in 
the  details  that  are  thus  related  so  briefly. 
She  must  strive  to  put  herself  in  the  place  of 
the  blind  man  at  each  stage  of  the  story,  and 
must  try  to  realize  how  he  thought  and  felt 
as  the  story  develops. 

In  order  to  get  a  proper  perspective  for  a 
story,  it  will  often  be  helpful  to  go  back  and 
study  the  scenes  and  events 
Preceding  Events  which  lead  up  to  that  with 
which  the  story  begins.  For 
example  in  the  study  of  the  scene  in  the  syn- 
agogue in  the  second  chapter  of  Mark,  the 
teacher  might  take  up  the  life  of  the  man 
with  an  unclean  spirit  before  that  day.  It  is 
very  probable  that  when  he  was  first  seized 
with  this  strange  affliction  he  was  either 
driven  from  the  community  where  he  lived 
on  account  of  the  superstitious  fears  of  those 


Special  Preparation  73 

about  him,  or  else  he  may  have  himself  felt 
constrained  to  hide  from  his  fellows,  and  so 
gone  out  to  live  in  caves  or  amid  the  tombs. 
Think  of  the  misery,  the  suffering,  the  lone- 
liness, the  utter  hopelessness  and  despair  of 
one  spending  his  life  in  this  manner.  Then 
think  of  the  contrast  between  the  day  before 
he  went  into  the  synagogue,  and  the  day 
after  he  met  the  Saviour.  Such  a  brief  study 
of  the  lives  of  the  leading  persons  just  before 
the  lesson  will  throw  light  on  their  thoughts, 
feelings  and  acts  in  the  passage  for  the  les- 
son. Think  of  the  life  of  Matthew  the  pub- 
lican, just  before  Jesus  met  him ;  of  Zaccheus ; 
of  the  woman  of  Samaria ;  of  Nicodemus ; 
of  the  leper  in  the  second  chapter  of  Mark ; 
of  the  rich  young  ruler ;  of  the  thief  on  the 
cross ;  of  Saul  on  the  way  to  Damascus.  In 
order  to  enter  fully  into  their  thoughts,  their 
feelings  and  their  actions  as  related  in  the 
Scripture,  it  is  necessary  to  go  back  of  the 
point  where  they  appear  in  the  story  and 
lead  up  to  the  first  scene. 

Every  mental  picture,  like  every  real  pic- 
ture, must  have  a  background.     The  teacher 


74        Ihe  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

must  next  try  to  form  a  vivid  picture  of  this 
background.     In  order  to  do  this,  she  must 

accumulate  a  store  of  mental 
The  Background       imagcs     of     the     lands    and 

places  where  the  events  of 
Bible  history  occurred.  A  visit  to  the 
Holy  Land  would  be  the  best  help  for 
this,  but  as  this  is  out  of  the  question  for 
most  teachers,  the  next  best  thing  is  to  study 
pictures  of  these  places.  Photographs  of 
historic  spots  in  Bible  history  are  now  to  be 
had  in  abundance.  The  stereoscopic  pictures 
taken  with  the  double  lens  such  as  those 
furnished  by  Underwood  and  Underwood, 
New  York,  are  especially  realistic.  The 
teacher  should  not  be  satisfied  with  a  glance 
at  such  pictures,  but  should  study  them  long 
and  patiently,  until  they  are  transferred  to 
her  own  memory.  To  these  should  be  added 
descriptions  of  the  scenes  wherever  the 
teacher  can  find  them.  Books  like  Stanley's 
"  Sinai  and  Palestine,"  George  Adam  Smith's 
**  Historical  Geography  of  the  Holy  Land," 
Thompson's  "  Land  and  the  Book,"  Geikie's 
"  Holy  Land  and  the  Bible,"  should  not  only 


Special  Preparation  75 

be  read  but  carefully  studied  with  constant 
effort  to  reproduce  the  scenes  in  the  imagi- 
nation. Relief  maps  are  exceedingly  helpful 
in  giving  proper  ideas  of  the  topography  of 
Palestine.  Models  of  oriental  houses,  and 
reproductions  of  oriental  costumes  should  be 
studied,  and  books  and  poems  which  give  a 
vivid  sense  of  the  atmosphere  and  surround- 
ings of  oriental  life  should  be  read. 

The  teacher  who  has  never  studied  it  can 
have  no  idea  of  how  much  more  real  and  in- 
teresting Bible  history  be- 
Historic  Spots  comcs,  whcn  its  background  is 
studied  and  reproduced  in  the 
imagination.  It  adds  wonderfully  to  the 
reality  and  interest  of  the  scenes  at  Sinai  to 
study  them  through  pictures  and  descriptions. 
The  teacher  who  follows  step  by  step  the 
journey  of  the  Israelites  through  the  wilder- 
ness and  their  experiences  at  Sinai  as  they  are 
traced  by  Stanley  in  his  "  Sinai  and  Palestine  " 
will  ever  after  have  a  deeper  understanding 
of  the  meaning  and  significance  of  that  great 
story.  So  a  careful  study  of  the  Lake  of 
Galilee  and  its  surroundings  gives  peculiar 


76        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

vividness  to  the  story  of  Jesus*  Galilean  min- 
istry. One  who  has  in  his  mind  a  picture  of 
those  two  hoary  mountains  Ebal  and  Gerizim, 
with  Jacob's  Well  lying  between  them  at  their 
eastern  edge,  will  have  a  far  better  idea  of  the 
story  of  the  woman  at  the  well.  It  brings 
us  closer  to  the  great  transfiguration  scene  to 
study  old  snow-capped  Hermon  and  its  place 
in  the  scenery  of  Palestine.  The  lives  of 
Samson,  Saul  and  David  are  better  under- 
stood after  a  study  of  the  Shephelah  or  low 
foot-hills  lying  between  the  central  hill  coun- 
try and  the  Philistine  plain. 

The  most  interesting  historic  spot  in  the 
world  is  the  city  of  Jerusalem.     Many  of  the 

most  important  scenes  in  Bible 
Jerusalem  history    wcre    located    there. 

The  teacher  should  carefully 
study  the  modern  city,  its  hills,  valleys, 
streets,  walls  and  buildings.  From  this  it 
will  be  quite  easy  to  work  back  to  the  city  as 
it  was  in  Bible  times.  While  there  is  still 
much  doubt  as  to  the  exact  location  of  the 
place  of  the  crucifixion,  the  garden  of 
Gethsemane,  etc.,  yet  the  main  features  re- 


special  Preparation  77 

main  the  same,  and  the  principal  places  of 
interest  can  be  located  with  sufficient  cer- 
tainty to  enable  the  teacher  to  picture  them 
in  imagination. 

The  teacher  who  will  thus  study  pictures 
and  descriptions  of  historic  places  in  the  Holy 
Land  and  practice  recalling 
A  Picture  Gallery  them,  wiU  soon  find  that  she 
is  storing  up  in  her  own  mind 
a  gallery  of  such  pictures  which  are  quickly 
recalled.  Jerusalem,  Nazareth,  Capernaum, 
Hebron,  Bethel,  Samaria,  the  Jordan  Valley, 
Jericho,  Carmel,  Gilboa,  Tabor,  the  Lake  of 
Galilee,  the  plain  of  Esdraelon,  will  be  names 
which  will  quickly  bring  before  her  mind 
vivid  pictures  which  will  form  the  background 
of  the  lesson  she  is  studying  or  teaching.  So 
the  Bible  will  become  a  new  book  to  her. 
She  will  have  a  deepening  sense  of  the  truth 
and  reality  of  these  scenes,  and  there  will 
grow  up  in  her  heart  a  love  for  the  land 
second  only  to  that  which  she  feels  for  her 
own  home  land.  It  is  truly  wonderful  that 
in  the  long  sweep  of  the  centuries  and  the 
many  changes  that  have  come  over  the  face 


78        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

of  the  earth,  so  much  of  the  original  scenery, 
topography,  social  life,  habits,  costumes,  and 
even  the  actual  towns,  on  the  same  spots, 
should  remain  in  this  little  country  to-day. 

If  the  scene  is  in  a  house,  a  mental  picture 
of  the  house  should  be  formed.     A  model  of 

an  oriental  house  will  be  of 
House  Scenes  great     assistance     here.      A 

teacher,  who  desired  to  teach 
the  lesson  of  the  healing  of  the  man  with  the 
palsy  in  the  second  chapter  of  Mark,  took 
a  small  empty  starch  box,  cut  a  hole  in  the 
top,  covered  it  with  light  brown  paper  on 
which  lines  were  drawn  to  indicate  stones,  and 
made  a  stairway  out  of  pasteboard  running 
up  along  side  of  the  box,  and  with  this  an  ef- 
fective lesson  was  taught.  Such  a  model  could 
be  used  for  a  number  of  lessons.  This  was  a 
model  of  a  poorer  class  of  houses.  Models  of 
the  better  class  of  houses  with  interior  court- 
yard, the  "  chamber  on  the  wall,"  etc.,  can  be 
obtained  at  small  cost.  The  room  where  the 
scene  occurs,  its  walls,  windows  (if  any),  doors, 
furniture,  all  should  be  brought  before  the 
mind.     Dwelling  on  these  details  helps  to  hold 


Special  Preparation  79 

the  image  before  the  mind  and  to  develop  its 
vividness.  A  careful  reading  of  books  like 
Stapler's  "  Palestine  in  the  Time  of  Christ," 
Trumbull's  "Studies  in  Oriental  Social  Life," 
etc.,  will  give  the  teacher  correct  ideas  of  how 
the  people  dressed,  the  way  they  lived,  their 
manner  of  furnishing  their  houses,  their  social 
customs, — such  as  feasts,  weddings,  funerals, 
— their  home  life,  their  occupations,  etc. 
As  the  life  of  the  people  in  Palestine  has 
changed  but  little  through  the  centuries,  books 
of  travel  in  Palestine  will  help  the  teacher  to 
accumulate  mental  images  necessary  for  the 
construction  of  accurate  pictures  of  life  in  that 
country  in  Bible  times.  Such  knowledge  is 
essential  in  order  that  the  teacher  may  not 
make  serious  blunders  in  describing  such 
scenes  like  that  of  the  teacher  who  said  she 
did  not  know  how  Peter  could  pray  on  the 
housetop  without  falling  off,  but  "  with  God 
all  things  are  possible  ! " 

A  number  of  scenes  in  the  life  of  Christ 
and  in  the  life  of  St.  Paul  occur  in  the  Jewish 
synagogue.  As  a  preparation  for  teaching 
these  lessons  the  teacher  should  study  the 


8o       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

interior  arrangements  of  these  buildings. 
They  were  usually  rectangular  in  shape  with 
flat  roofs  supported  by  rows 
The  Synagogue  of  pillars.  At  One  end  were 
the  chief  seats  for  the  elders, 
the  ark  for  the  law,  the  reader's  desk  and  the 
lamp.  Some  of  them  had  benches  for  the 
worshippers  ;  others  were  without  these  and 
the  worshippers  sat  on  the  floor.  There  was 
a  latticed  gallery  for  the  women.  In  studying 
a  lesson  like  the  scene  in  the  synagogue  at 
Capernaum  in  the  second  chapter  of  Mark, 
the  teacher  should  endeavour  to  form  a  vivid 
picture  of  the  interior  of  this  synagogue  as  it 
looked  during  that  dramatic  incident. 

Where  a  scene  is  located  in  the  open  air, 
it  should  be  studied  in  the  same  way.     Sup- 
pose it  is  the  story  of  Jacob's 
In  the  Open  vision  at  Bcthcl  in  the  twenty- 

eighth  chapter  of  Genesis  that 
is  to  be  studied.  J  Jacob  had  bid  farewell  to 
Isaac  and  Rebecca  and  had  gone  out  from 
Beersheba.  With  his  wallet  filled  with  food 
for  the  journey,  his  staff  in  his  hand,  and  his 
garments  gathered  up  in  his  girdle,  he  started 


Special  Preparation  8l 

on  his  long  journey  towards  the  North.  At 
sunset  he  stops  to  rest  for  the  night.  He  is 
on  a  hilltop ;  the  stillness  of  the  evening,  the 
loneliness  of  the  hills,  the  dark  shadows  of 
the  valleys  are  around  him ;  he  is  footsore 
and  weary  and  homesick  ;  he  eats  his  lonely 
meal ;  and  gathering  his  garments  about  him 
with  a  stone  for  a  pillow  he  lies  down  to 
sleep.  The  blue  sky  is  over  his  head  ;  the 
stars  are  shining  brightly  through  that  clear 
Syrian  air ;  the  soft  breezes  fan  his  cheeks  ; 
the  silence  is  broken  only  by  the  cry  of  some 
wild  animal.  As  he  closes  his  eyes,  mem- 
ories of  his  past  life  float  before  him  :  the 
evening  scenes  of  the  camp  at  Beersheba, 
the  coming  of  the  herds,  the  noise  and 
clamour  of  watering  the  flocks  ;  the  milking 
of  the  kine ;  the  evening  meal,  the  talk  and 
laughter,  the  songs  and  tales  of  the  camp ; 
then  the  face  of  his  old  father,  the  face  of  his 
mother ;  the  scenes  of  his  childhood,  the  re- 
ligious teaching  he  had  received  ;  the  stories 
of  his  grandfather  Abraham  ;  the  covenant 
with  God  ;  his  sin ;  then  the  future,  its 
dangers,    its    uncertainties.     Lonely,   home- 


82        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

sick  and  afraid,  he  falls  asleep.  Then  comes 
that  beautiful  dream,  bringing  with  it  a  sense 
of  the  nearness  of  God.  "  Surely  Jehovah  is 
in  this  place  and  I  knew  it  not.  How  dread- 
ful is  this  place.  This  is  none  other  than  the 
house  of  God.     This  is  the  gate  of  heaven." 

So  wherever  the  scene  may  be  laid,  in  the 
valley,  on  the  hillside  or  mountain  top,  along 
the  highway,  by  lake  or  seaside,  in  the  open 
field,  in  house  or  synagogue,  a  determined 
efiort  should  be  made  to  bring  it  vividly  be- 
fore the  mind. 

Having  thus  studied  the  background,  the 
persons  in  the  scene  must  be  studied.  Pic- 
tures of  oriental  costumes  may 
The  Persons  be   Studied   until    it  becomes 

easy  to  picture  the  dress  of 
the  persons  in  the  scene.  The  face  is  harder 
to  imagine.  The  hair,  the  forehead,  the 
look  of  the  eyes,  the  expression  of  the  mouth 
and  chin,  the  tone  of  the  voice,  each  gesture 
that  the  person  makes  while  he  is  speaking, 
each  act  that  he  performs  in  the  scene  may  all 
be  brought  before  the  mind.  The  greater  the 
number  of  these  details  the  longer  the  image 


Special  Preparation  83 

is  held  and  the  more  vivid  it  becomes.  The 
teacher  may  seek  the  aid  of  the  great  artists 
in  forming  such  pictures.  Michael-Angelo's 
Moses  and  David,  Raphael's  Paul,  and  other 
pictures,  reproductions  of  which  may  now  be 
had,  can  be  used  for  this  purpose. 

The  study  of  the  dress,  face,  gestures,  ac- 
tions,  etc.,  is  not  enough.     More  important 

than  these  it  is  to  try  to  im- 
Their  Mental  States  agiuc  thc  mental  State  of  each 

person.  We  must  not  stop 
with  the  outside.  We  must  try  to  pluck  out 
the  heart  of  his  mystery,  get  inside  of  him, 
put  ourselves  in  his  place,  and  imagine  his 
emotions  as  he  speaks  or  acts,  in  the  scene. 
Psychologists  tell  us  that  the  "  sense  of 
reality  "  depends  much  upon  the  emotions. 
Things  seen  in  the  cold  light  of  the  intellect 
are  apt  to  seem  unreal,  while  things  seen  in 
a  glow  of  emotion  become  intensely  real. 
So  there  is  nothing  that  will  give  the  sense 
of  reality  to  a  mental  picture  of  a  person  like 
that  of  entering  into  and  sharing  his  feelings. 
In  forming  a  vivid  picture  of  a  person  in 
the  lesson  it  will  often  be  helpful  to  run  over 


84       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

in  the  mind  the  memories  that  person  may 
have  had  at  the  moment  related  in  the  les- 
son. At  any  given  moment 
Their  Memories  of  his  Hfe  each  individual  is 
the  sum  of  all  his  past  experi- 
ences, he  is  what  his  past  life  has  made  him. 
These  memories  of  his  past  life  lie  in  his  sub- 
conscious mind  and  may  at  any  moment 
rush  up  into  consciousness.  They  are  espe- 
cially apt  to  do  so  at  the  great  turning  points 
and  crises  in  life.  But  even  if  they  should 
not  do  so,  it  will  help  us  to  realize  the  person 
in  the  lesson  if  we  put  ourselves  in  his  place, 
and  run  over  his  past  life  leading  up  to  the 
scene  in  the  lesson.  In  such  a  lesson  as  that 
in  the  eighth  chapter  of  Judges  for  example, 
where  the  elders  of  Israel  came  to  Samuel 
and  demanded  a  king,  try  to  put  yourself  in 
Samuel's  place  at  that  moment,  and  think  of 
the  memories  that  would  come  welling  up 
within  him  as  it  dawned  upon  him  what  this 
demand  would  mean  to  him.  The  farewells 
of  Moses,  of  Joshua,  and  of  Samuel ;  the 
memories  of  David  when  he  was  anointed 
King  of  Israel  after  his  long  and  trying  ordeal 


Special  Preparation  85 

of  discipline  under  the  providential  guidance 
of  God ;  Elijah's  thoughts  during  that  last 
walk  with  Elisha  to  the  Jordan ;  Jeremiah's 
memories  at  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  ;  the  mem- 
ories of  the  aged  Hebrews  at  the  rebuilding 
of  the  temple ;  Saul's  memories  when  he 
found  himself  rejected  of  the  Lord ;  Paul's 
memories  during  those  three  days  of  blind- 
ness in  Damascus  ;  Peter's  memories  during 
that  night  in  prison  when  he  expected  to  be 
led  forth  the  next  day  to  his  death  ;  the  disci- 
ples' memories  on  that  last  evening  in  the 
upper  room  in  Jerusalem  ;  our  Saviour's  mem- 
ories that  awful  night  in  the  Garden  of  Geth- 
semane  :  By  dwelling  on  these  in  imagina- 
tion we  find  ourselves  coming  into  closer 
sympathy  and  fellowship  with  these  persons. 
All  this  is  a  part  of  that  process  of  "  putting 
yourself  in  his  place,"  which  is  essential  to 
the  sympathetic  understanding  of  another  hu- 
man soul. 

It  is  not  easy  to  form  a  vivid  picture  of  a 
person  in  this  broad  sense.  Personality  is  a 
very  complex  thing.  Our  conceptions  of 
persons  are  formed  from  a  large  number  of 


86        The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

single  impressions  made  under  varying  cir- 
cumstances.    But  where  there  is  a  series  of 

lessons  about  the  same  per- 
personaiity  son,  as  often  happens  in  the 

Sunday-school,  the  teacher 
who  will  take  the  time  and  have  the  patience 
to  study  him  in  the  manner  suggested,  will  find 
growing  up  in  her  mind  a  more  and  more 
vivid  picture  of  him,  and  she  will  gain  a 
deeper  insight  into  the  truths  which  are  re- 
vealed in  the  life  and  experience  of  this  person. 
It  may  be  objected  that  a  greater  knowl- 
edge of  the  Bible  is  here  assumed  on  the  part 

of  the  teacher  than  it  is  fair 

mbrNe«s:LT  t^  ^^^P^^t  ^^^^  the  average 
worker  in  the  Sunday-school. 
It  is  true  that  Sunday-school  teaching  does 
make  large  demands  upon  the  teacher.  No 
teacher  who  has  any  desire  to  succeed  in  this 
work  will  be  satisfied  with  a  scrappy  study  of 
each  lesson  as  it  comes  from  week  to  week. 
In  taking  up  a  series  of  lessons,  the  book 
from  which  they  are  taken  should  be  read 
straight  through  from  beginning  to  end.  If 
this  were  done  at  a  single  sitting  it  would  be 


special  Preparation  87 

all  the  better.  The  teacher  should  read  it 
through  often  enough  to  familiarize  herself 
with  its  general  outline  and  contents.  If  the 
teacher  would  read  the  Bible  straight  through 
in  course  a  few  times,  it  would  help  her  very 
much  in  the  teaching  of  the  individual  lessons. 

Where  there  are  a  number  of  scenes  in  the 
story,  it  will  not  be  possible  to  study  them 
all  in  the  manner  suggested. 
Selection  Necessary  The  tcacher  may  be  com- 
pelled to  select  those  which 
are  more  important,  more  dramatic  and  in- 
teresting, and  spend  her  time  on  them. 
Even  if  it  is  not  intended  to  dwell  upon  them 
all  at  length  in  the  teaching  of  the  lesson,  it 
helps  to  give  it  unity  and  reality  in  the  mind 
of  the  teacher  to  study  each  scene  from  be- 
ginning to  end  of  the  incident  in  this  way. 

In  developing  the  scenes  of  the  lesson  it 
will  be  found  helpful  to  make  brief  notes  of 
the  details  as  they  come  before 
Notes  the  mind.     If  this  is  not  done, 

the  mind  is  apt  to  dwell  upon 
one  detail  too  long.  When  it  is  jotted  down, 
it  is  easy  to  pass  to  the  next.     When  all  of 


88       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

the  details  are  thus  noted,  the  notes  help  to 
recall  them,  and  by  going  over  the  notes  a 
number  of  times,  the  several  details  become 
moulded  into  a  unity  with  proper  perspective 
and  proportion.  The  notes  need  not  be  writ- 
ten out  in  full.  It  will  be  found  usually  that 
a  single  word  or  two  will  serve  to  recall  the 
detail. 


IX 

PRESENTING  THE  LESSON  FACTS 

HAVING  gotten  the  facts  clearly  and 
vividly  before   her   own   mind,  the 
teacher  is  now  ready  for  the  next 
step,  and  must  plan  how  best  to  bring  them 
before  the  imagination  of  the  pupil.     This 
will  be  easier  than  it  was  to 
fo°p'i;pTr'*'"  get  the  lesson  into  the  teach- 

er's own  mind.  Children  have 
active  and  sympathetic  imaginations.  They 
are  quick  to  seize  upon  suggestions  given  by 
the  teacher.  It  will  be  found,  too,  that  the 
more  vividly  the  lesson  appears  to  the 
teacher,  the  easier  it  will  be  for  her  to  bring 
it  to  the  pupil.  It  is  easy  to  describe  things 
which  we  see  with  glowing  imagination. 
The  teacher  who  vividly  realizes  the  story 
herself  will  almost  unconsciously  add  many 
little   details   which  will   give   the   sense   of 

reality  to  what  she  talks  about. 

89 


90       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

There  are  several  ways  in  which  the  lesson 
facts  may  be  brought  before  the  imagination 

of  the  pupil.  For  the  younger 
Methods  children  the  best  method  is  to 

throw  the  lesson  into  the  form 
of  a  story.  Story  telling  is  an  art  in  itself, 
and  it  would  require  a  separate  volume  to 
treat  of  it  adequately.  Making  the  story 
one's  own,  and  then  practice,  are  two  es- 
sentials to  success.  Even  in  teaching  older 
pupils  the  story  method  is  often  effective. 
Everybody  loves  a  story,  and  there  is  no 
doubt  of  its  teaching  power.  Another  method 
is  to  ask  questions  which  call  for  an  effort  of 
the  imagination.  There  are  three  principal 
kinds  of  questions  in  Sunday-school  teach- 
ing :  those  which  require  an  answer  from 
memory ;  those  which  call  for  an  expression 
of  judgment,  and  those  which  appeal  to  the 
imagination.  Let  the  teacher  note  these 
three  kinds,  and  let  her  practice  framing 
questions  which  call  for  the  use  of  the  imagina- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  pupil.  By  a  series  of 
such  questions  she  may  set  the  mind  of  the 
pupil  to  work,  and  may  draw  from  him  the 


Presenting  the  Lesson  Facts  91 

picture  which  he  sees,  and  in  the  effort  to 
answer,  the  picture  will  come  out  in  his  mind 
more  clearly.  Or  the  teacher  may  ask  the 
pupil  to  tell  the  story  in  his  own  words,  inter- 
jecting questions  which  will  help  to  develop 
it  in  his  imag-ination.  Or  she  may  combine 
these  methods,  now  telling  the  story  herself, 
now  giving  a  bit  of  description,  now  asking 
questions  of  the  pupil,  and  now  getting  the 
pupil  to  describe  it  as  he  sees  it.  A  teacher 
who  studies  the  use  and  development  of  the 
imagination  will  become  expert  in  detecting 
the  vague  and  indefinite  character  of  the 
pupil's  mental  images,  and  in  adding  just  the 
needed  touch  to  help  him  to  see  it  more 
clearly.  It  will  also  be  found  that  with  prac- 
tice the  teacher  acquires  facility  in  selecting 
just  the  right  words  to  describe  the  scene,  or 
to  give  the  air  of  reality  to  the  lesson  facts. 
The  tendency  at  first  will  be  to  overload  the 
lesson  with  details.  The  teacher  will  try  to 
bring  before  the  pupil  all  that  she  has  worked 
out  in  her  own  imagination  and  pretty  much 
in  the  same  order  that  it  has  come  to  her. 
But   with   growing   skill,    she  will   learn    to 


92       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

select  the  most  important  and  interesting  de- 
tails, to  arrange  them  in  the  most  effective 
order,  and  to  express  them  in  the  happiest 
manner. 

In  developing  the  lesson  in  the  imagina- 
tion of  the  pupil,  diagrams  can  often  be  used 

to  great  advantage.  There 
Diagrams  is  morc  teaching  power  even 

in  a  crude  diagram  or  draw- 
ing than  most  teachers  realize.  The  rough 
lines  and  marks  are  quickly  seized  by  the 
imagination  of  the  pupil  and  translated  into 
a  picture.  They  give  an  impulse  to  the  im- 
aginative faculty,  and  enable  it  to  work  with 
greater  ease  and  facility.  A  teacher  who  was 
teaching  the  story  of  Paul's  arrest  at  Philippi  ^ 
drew  upon  the  blackboard  two  lines  repre- 
senting the  banks  of  a  river;  alongside  of 
them  a  rough  plan  of  the  city  was  drawn, 
with  gates  on  the  east,  south,  west  and 
north  ;  a  large  square  was  drawn  around  the 
southern  gate  to  indicate  the  market-place ; 
a  small  square  on  the  side  of  this  represented 
the  prison  ;  a  number  of  lines  were  drawn  to 

1  Acts  xvi.  1 1-40. 


Presenting  the  Lesson  Facts  93 

indicate  streets,  one  street  running  east  to 
the  gate  by  the  river.  On  this  a  small  square 
represented  the  house  of  Lydia.  Two  or 
three  upright  marks  at  the  crossing  of  two 
streets  indicated  the  slave  girl  and  her  mas- 
ters. As  the  lesson  was  taught,  a  chalk  line 
was  drawn  from  the  house  of  Lydia  down 
the  street  to  the  corner  where  the  girl  was 
encountered,  from  there  to  the  market-place 
where  the  hearing  before  the  magistrates  was 
had  ;  and  from  there  to  the  prison  ;  from  there 
to  the  house  of  Lydia  where  the  farewells 
were  said  to  the  church,  and  then  to  the 
western  gate.  It  was  frankly  stated  that  the 
plan  was  imaginary,  yet  it  covered  the  main 
features  of  the  story,  and  brought  them  out 
with  a  distinctness  that  could  not  have  been 
had  without  them.  The  advantage  of  such 
a  diagram  is  that  it  does  not  require  skill  to 
draw,  it  does  not  take  much  time  to  make, 
and  however  roughly  drawn  it  answers  the 
purpose  almost  as  well  as  a  sketch  carefully 
and  skillfully  drawn  with  all  the  details 
filled  in. 

Maps  should  be  in  constant  use  to  trace 


94        I'he  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

journeys  and  locate  places.  In  using  maps, 
however,  it  must  be  remembered  that  a  map 

is  a  mere  symbol  and  that 
Maps  it  must  be  supplemented  with 

word  pictures  or  it  will  not  help 
much  in  understanding  the  lesson.  Indeed 
unless  it  is  so  supplemented  it  may  mislead 
rather  than  help  the  pupil.  On  the  map  the 
journey  of  Paul  and  Barnabas  from  Perga  to 
Antioch  in  Pisidia '  is  indicated  by  a  red  line 
possibly  half  an  inch  long.  Yet  that  journey 
led  through  a  high  mountain  range,  along  a 
steep,  toilsome  and  lonely  road,  infested  with 
robbers  and  other  dangers  so  great  that  they 
probably  scared  John  Mark  and  caused  him 
to  turn  back  home.  A  look  at  the  map 
would  utterly  fail  to  show  the  pupil  what  this 
journey  meant.  So  the  cities  on  the  map 
are  represented  by  small  dots.  These  the 
teacher  must  translate  into  large  cities,  with 
strong  walls  and  gates,  with  narrow,  crooked 
streets,  flat-roofed  houses,  public  squares, 
and  buildings,  with  swarms  of  people  moving 
up  and   down,  in  and  out  of  the  stores  and 

'  Acts  xiii.  13-14. 


Presenting  the  Lesson  Facts  95 

bazaars,  and  filling  the  temples  and  theatres, 
people  as  real,  as  human,  as  those  who 
walk  the  streets  of  our  cities  to-day.  No 
wonder  maps  are  uninteresting  to  pupils 
when  they  are  merely  glanced  at  and  no 
attempt  is  made  to  translate  the  symbol 
into  the  reality.  We  have  already  pointed 
out  the  usefulness  of  the  relief  map  in  giv- 
ing correct  ideas  as  to  the  topography  of  a 
country. 

We  have  also  spoken  of  the  help  which 
pictures    give    to    the    imagination.      They 

should  be  in  constant  use  in 
Pictures  the  class.     Many  schools  are 

putting  in  the  stereoscopic  pic- 
tures previously  referred  to.  With  two  of 
the  instruments  and  the  pictures,  they  may 
be  used  very  effectively  in  an  ordinary  sized 
class. 

Models  of  oriental  houses,  of  the  synagogue 
and  the  temple,  of  articles  of  furniture,  of  an 

oriental  tomb,  etc.,  can  now 
Models  be    obtained    and    are   very 

helpful. 
A  very  effective  method  of  teaching  a  les- 


96       The  Attack  on  the  Imagination 

son  is  that  of  taking  the  class  around  a  sand 
box,  and  having  them  make  the  relief  map 

in  the  sand,  then  with  the  aid 
Sand  Box  of   the   stercoscopic  pictures, 

tracing  the  scenes  of  the  story 
on  the  sand  map. 


X 

WHAT  IS  INTEREST? 

FOUR  very  powerful  influences  act  upon 
the  will  and  produce  the  larger  num- 
ber of  our  actions.    These  are  (i)  sug- 
gestion, that  is  the  forming  in  the  mind  of  a 
mental  picture  of  the  action  to  be  performed ; 
(2)    imitation,  that  is   seeing 
Influences  either  actually  or  in  imagina- 

tion some  one  else  do  the  act ; 
(3)  habit ;  and  (4)  emotion. 

"The   executive   force   of    an   idea,"  says 
Jules  Payot  in  his  "  Education  of  the  Will," 
"almost  always   comes   from 
Payot  its     union    with     those     real 

sources  of  power  which  we 
call  the  affective  states.  Every  turn  of  ex- 
perience convinces  us  of  the  feebleness  of 
ideas.  .  .  .  All  force  which  instigates  im- 
portant actions  emanates  from  sensibility. 
When  sensibility  is  profoundly  diminished, 
when  there  is  no  joy  following  sensation, 
97 


98  Capturing  the  Emotions 

then  the  idea  remains  inert  and  cold.  .  .  . 
The  will  is  not  fond  of  carrying  out  the  cold 
orders  it  receives  from  the  intelligence.  As 
it  is  the  organ  of  all  power  and  feeling,  it 
wants  emotional  orders  tinged  with  passion. 

.  .  All  volition  is  preceded  by  a  wave 
of  emotion,  an  effective  perception  of  the  act 
to  be  accomplished.  .  .  .  It  is  necessary 
therefore  if  we  would  weld  an  idea  solidly 
and  indestructibly  to  a  desired  action,  that 
we  should  fuse  them  together  by  the  heat  of 
an  emotion."  ' 

The  power  to  feel  is  one  of  the  most  won- 
derful and  mysterious  that  the  human  mind 
possesses.  On  the  eastern 
A  Wonderful  gj^^  ^j  ^^^  ^j^^,  ^f  Jcrusalcm 

is  a  spring  of  water  which  is 
now  called  the  "  Virgin's  Pool."  A  remark- 
able peculiarity  of  this  spring  is  that  its  flow 
is  intermittent.  The  water  in  the  basin  of 
the  pool  is  sometimes  so  low  that  it  seems  as 
though  the  water  had  stopped  flowing,  but 
at  certain  hours  of  the  day,  the  water  sud- 
denly begins  to  well  up  and  comes  with  such 

'  Op.  cit.,  p.  54  ff. 


What  is  Interest  ?  99 

force  and  rapidity  that  the  basin  is  soon 
filled  to  overflowing.  This  mysterious  rise 
and  fail  of  the  water  has  been  a  source  of 
wonder  and  awe  to  the  natives  for  centuries. 
No  one  has  ever  been  able  to  discover  the 
cause  of  it.  Many  of  the  natives  look  upon 
it  as  supernatural. 

The  power  to  feel,  to  experience  emotion, 

which  the  mind  possesses  may  not  inaptly 

be  compared  to  the  Virgin's 

Riae  and  Fall  Pool.         CoUCCaled     within     US 

and  closely  connected  with  the 
brain  and  nervous  system,  is  this  strange 
fountain  which  is  continually  rising  and  fall- 
ing, and  sometimes  its  movements  are  as 
mysterious  as  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  Virgin's 
Pool.  At  times  it  seems  as  though  it  had 
entirely  disappeared.  As  we  go  about  our 
daily  tasks,  performing  them,  perhaps,  in  a 
mechanical  manner,  it  would  be  hard  to 
discover  even  a  trace  of  feeling  in  our 
minds.  But  some  objects  have  the  power  to 
open  the  gate,  as  it  were,  of  the  fountain, 
and  the  moment  such  an  object  enters  the 
mind,  there  is  a  swift  rise  of  feeling.     It  may 


loo  Capturing  the  Emotions 

be  only  a  slight  flow  of  the  current,  or  it  may 
come  with  a  flood  that  sweeps  everything 
before  it,  so  that  the  whole  mind  is  filled  with 
it,  and  it  rushes  along  the  nerves  to  every 
part  of  the  body. 

When  the  rise  of  feeling  is  marked,  it  takes 
on  many  different  phases :  love,  fear,  anger, 
joy,  sorrow,  aversion,    desire, 
Interest  louging,  auxiety,  pain,  pleas- 

ure, etc.  When  it  first  begins 
to  rise,  or  when  the  rise  is  not  so  marked  as 
to  take  on  any  of  these  various  forms,  we  give 
it  the  name  of  "  interest."  When  the  stream 
has  risen  to  its  height,  it  begins  to  recede, 
hence  interest  in  any  subject  cannot  be  sus- 
tained, ordinarily,  for  any  length  of  time,  un- 
less there  is  change  and  variety  in  the  im- 
ages presented  to  the  mind. 

What  would  life  be  without  the  emotions  ? 
Without  the  power  to  feel,  we  would  be  in- 
different to  everything.     We 
kI^T'  would    not    think,    for    there 

must  be  some  pleasure  in 
thinking  in  order  to  overcome  the  natural  in- 
ertia of  the  mind.     We  would  not  do  any- 


What  is  Interest"?  loi 

thing,  for  back  of  every  volition  there  must 
be  more  or  less  interest.  We  would  be  in- 
different to  the  world  of  nature,  for  we  would 
have  none  of  the  higher  aesthetic  emotions. 
All  the  ties  which  bind  us  to  our  fellows 
would  disappear,  for  they  are  all  rooted  in 
feeling.  Nothing  would  be  of  any  value  to 
us,  for  consciousness  of  value  takes  its  rise 
from  feeling.  A  life  so  entirely  negative  and 
colourless  would  hardly  be  worth  the  living. 

When  our  attention  is  first  called  to  this 
power,  it  seems  to  be  very  capricious.     It  is 

capricious  in  its  coming  and 
Caprice  going.     A  sccne  upon  which 

we  have  looked  many  times, 
without  a  thought  of  anything  beautiful 
about  it,  at  an  unexpected  moment  becomes 
transfigured  with  loveliness.  A  young  man 
looks  upon  a  young  woman  with  indifference 
and  then  suddenly  falls  in  love  with  her. 
The  poem  which  I  read  with  such  delight 
yesterday  to-day  fails  to  move  me ;  to-morrow 
I  may  read  it  again  and  it  somehow  will  fit 
into  my  mood  and  take  on  new  freshness  and 
meaning.     One  day  our  mood  is  glad  and 


102  Capturing  the  Emotions 

joyous,  the  next  we  are  depressed  and 
gloomy,  and  we  cannot  give  any  reason  for 
the  change. 

Objects  which  have  power  to  awaken  feel- 
ing often  seem  to  be  capricious  also.     What 
interests  one  person  fails  to  at- 
Differing  ^      ^  auothcr.     The  child,  the 

Interests  ' 

boy,  the  youth,  the  man,  each 
has  his  own  peculiar  interests  in  life.  The 
boy  wonders  at  the  interests  of  the  man,  the 
man  smiles  at  the  childish  interests  of  the 
boy.  Even  those  who  are  passing  through 
the  same  stage  of  growth  have  interests  dif- 
ferent from  one  another.  Children  of  the 
same  family  and  near  an  age  differ  re- 
markably in  their  tastes  and  interests.  In 
nothing  do  we  differ  from  one  another  so 
much  as  in  the  response  we  make  in  feeling 
to  different  objects. 

The  power  to  feel  is  not,  however,  so 
capricious  as  these  instances  would  make 
it  appear.  Each  person  is  born  with 
certain  natural  interests.  These  are  added 
to  in  the  growth  of  the  mind  and  the  ex- 
periences of  life  in  a  manner  which  will  be 


What  is  Interest"?  103 

hereafter  explained.  It  is  not  proposed  to 
give  here  a  technical  exposition  of  the  psy- 
chology of  interest.  This  subject  is  still 
under  investigation,  and  experts  on  the 
science  of  mind  are  not  yet  agreed  in  their 
conclusions  concerning  it.  What  we  desire 
to  do  is  to  give  the  teacher  some  simple  sug- 
gestions which  will  enable  her  to  select  the 
lesson  material  and  to  present  it  in  a  way  that 
will  interest  the  pupils. 


XI 

INTEREST  IN  LESSON  FACTS 

OBJECTS  of   interest   always  possess 
some  familiarity.     That  which  is  en- 
tirely strange  is  not  interesting.     A 
new  study  is  apt  to  be  dry  at  the  beginning. 
Usually  strange  people  do  not  attract  us  at 
first.     The   Bible  is  an  unin- 
Famiiiarity  tcrcstiug  boolc  to  many  simply 

because  of  its  unfamiliarity. 
The  places,  persons  and  events  belong  to  a 
far-away  time  and  a  far-off  land.  They  seem 
to  belong  to  another  world  and  out  of  all 
connection  with  every-day  life.  So  every 
teacher  has  felt  the  difficulty  of  beginning  a 
lesson  which  is  entirely  unfamiliar  to  the 
pupils.  Their  blank  looks  and  listless  atti- 
tudes betray  their  lack  of  interest.  Every 
teacher  knows  how  much  easier  it  is  to  teach 
pupils   who   come   to   the   class   with   some 

knowledge  of   the  lesson.     Here  is  another 
104 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  105" 

application  of  the  law  of  apperception.  The 
law  of  interest  requires  the  preparation  of 
the  mind  by  recalling  familiar  facts  and 
truths. 

On  the  other  hand  some  novelty  is  neces- 
sary to  awaken  interest.  We  are  always 
eager  to  learn  something  new 
Novelty  about  familiar  things.     Curi- 

osity, the  craving  for  new 
knowledge  and  new  experience,  is  a  natural 
interest.  We  are  born  with  it  and  never  lose 
it.  A  pupil  soon  tires  of  a  teacher  who  con- 
stantly repeats  the  same  truths ;  who  goes 
over  the  same  ground  in  the  same  way  ;  who 
never  surprises.  So  the  teacher  must  strive 
to  bring  something  new  and  fresh  to  her 
class  in  each  lesson.  Old  truths  may  be  given 
fresh  setting  in  new  groups  of  lesson  facts. 
The  more  thorough  study  the  teacher  gives  to 
the  lesson,  the  more  likely  she  is  to  find  some- 
thing new  in  it.  So  the  teacher  must  be  ever 
seeking  illustrations  which  show  the  truth  in 
a  different  light. 

Interest  in  an  object  depends  very  much  on 
the  vividness  with  which  it  is  presented  to  the 


lo6  Capturing  the  Emotions 

mind.      Objects    of    sense    arouse    interest 
quickly  because  of  the  vividness  with  which 

they  are  presented. 
Vividness  In     like     manner     interest 

in  objects  presented  to  the 
imagination  will  depend  largely  upon  the 
vividness  with  which  they  appear  to  the 
mind.  In  reading  a  story  laid  in  places  that 
are  familiar,  we  feel  greater  interest  be- 
cause of  the  ease  and  quickness  with  which 
we  form  mental  pictures  of  the  background 
of  the  tale.  When  we  have  seen  a  famous 
person,  we  will  always  be  more  interested  in 
what  we  read  about  him,  because  of  the  pic- 
ture of  him  that  we  carry  in  our  minds.  An- 
other reason  why  a  good  illustration  awakens 
interest  is  because  it  is  usually  concrete  and 
brings  a  picture  to  the  imagination.  Stories 
that  delight  children,  such  as  Robinson 
Crusoe,  always  have  this  quality  of  concrete- 
ness  and  vividness. 

Personality  is  interesting  to  us.  It  is  the 
one  supremely  interesting  thing  in  the  world. 
Let  the  teacher  grasp  the  significance  of 
this  fact :     That  we  are  born  with  a  natural, 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  107 

deep-rooted   interest   in   persons.     Our  first 
contact  in  life  is  with  a  person,  in  the  loving 

embrace  of  our  mother.  Per- 
pertonaiity  SOUS  occupy  a  larger  place  in 

the  child's  mind  than  anything 
else.  All  through  our  experience  in  the 
world,  our  lives  are  pressed  close  against 
other  lives  ;  they  influence  us  in  a  thousand 
ways  ;  they  dominate  our  thought,  our  feel- 
ings, our  imaginations  and  our  wills.  It  is  the 
personal  element  in  them  that  sends  us  to  the 
newspaper,  the  magazine,  the  novel,  the  biog- 
raphy, the  history,  the  poem  and  the  drama. 
Even  nature  needs  a  human  element  added 
to  it  to  make  it  interesting  to  us  as  John  Bur- 
roughs has  so  well  shown  us. 

We  are   naturally  and  instinctively  inter- 
ested in   the   actions   of  persons,  especially 

where  an  action  means  some- 
Dramatic  Action       thing,  where    it    involves  the 

life  and  destiny  of  the  person 
who  acts.  The  delight  of  children  in  make 
believe  play  is  well  known.  The  love  of 
grown  people  for  dramatic  action  is  so  strong 
that  thousands  gather  in  our  theatres  every 


io8  Capturing  the  Emotions 

night  to  watch  the  mimic  play.  Boys  de- 
light in  stories  of  adventure  that  are  full  of 
movement.  A  baseball  game  is  full  of  dra- 
matic action.  The  mature  man  studies  the 
great  tragedies  of  Shakespeare  in  which  the 
leading  character  is  caught  in  the  toils  of  his 
own  deed  and  is  carried  down  to  ruin.  Life 
about  us  is  full  of  the  dramatic.  Comedies 
and  tragedies  are  being  enacted  all  about  us 
if  we  only  had  eyes  to  see  them. 

Each   one   of   the  five  elements  of  interest 

thus   far  considered  is  found  in  the  greatest 

abundance   in   the  Bible,  and 

The  Bible  especially  in  the  teachings  of 

Jesus. 

Jesus  makes  constant  use  of  the  most 7^- 
7niliar  things  in  His  teaching.  '*  In  the  house 
we  see  the  cup  and  the  platter,  the  lamp  and 
the  candlestick  ;  we  see  the  servants  grinding 
the  meal  between  the  millstones,  and  then 
hiding  the  leaven  in  it  till  the  whole  is  leav- 
ened ;  we  see  the  mother  of  the  family  sewing 
a  piece  of  cloth  on  an  old  garment  and  the 
father  straining  the  wine  into  the  skin  bottles  ; 
we   see   at   the   door  the  hen  gathering  her 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  109 

chickens  under  her  wings  and,  in  the  streets, 
the  children  playing  at  marriages  and  funer- 
als. Out  in  the  fields  we  see  the  lilies  in 
their  stately  beauty  rivalling  Solomon's,  the 
crows  picking  up  the  seed  behind  the  sower, 
and  the  birds  in  their  nests  among  the 
branches  ;  the  doves  and  the  sparrows,  dogs 
and  swine,  the  fig  tree  and  the  bramble  bush. 
Looking  up  we  see  the  cloud  carried  over  the 
landscape  by  the  south  wind,  the  red  sky  of 
evening  promising  fair  weather  for  the  mor- 
row and  the  lightning  flashing  from  one  end 
of  the  heavens  to  the  other.  We  see  the 
vineyard  with  its  tower  and  winepress ;  the 
field  adorned  with  the  tender  blade  of  spring 
or  sprinkled  with  the  reapers  among  the 
yellow  grain  in  autumn,  the  sheep,  too,  yon- 
der in  their  pastures,  and  the  shepherd  going 
before  them  seeking  the  lost  one  over  hill 
and  dale."  ' 

On  the  other  hand  note  the  wonderful 
freshness  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus.  The  peo- 
ple who  flocked  around  Him  had  never  heard 
great   truths  put  in  such  new  and  surprising 

1  Stalker  in  "  Imago  Christi,"  p.  254. 


1 1  o  Capturing  the  Emotions 

ways.  So  fresh,  so  original,  so  unique  are 
these  parables  and  illustrations  that  they 
never  grow  old  even  to  us  who  have  heard 
them  over  and  over  again,  centuries  after 
they  were  first  uttered. 

The  peculiar  vividness  of  the  Old  Testament 
stories  and  the  parables  of  Jesus  form  a  large 
element  in  their  charm  for  old  and  young. 

The  Hebrew  language  "  had  no  words  ex- 
cept for  the  concrete  objects  of  the  external 
world.  All  the  words  of  the  old  Hebrew 
went  back  to  things  of  sense,  and  in  conse- 
quence even  their  every-day  language  was 
figurative  in  a  way  which  we  can  hardly  im- 
agine. The  verb  to  be  jealous  was  a  regular 
form  of  the  word  to  glozu ;  the  noun  truth 
was  derived  from  the  verb  meaning  to  prop ^ 
to  build  or  to  make  fir 7n.  The  word  for  self 
was  also  the  word  for  bone.  Anger  is  ex- 
pressed in  Hebrew  in  a  throng  of  ways,  each 
picturesque,  and  each  borrowed  from  physio- 
logical facts.  Now  the  metaphor  is  taken  from 
the  rapid  and  animated  breathing  which  ac- 
companies the  passion,  now  from  heat  or 
from   boiling,   now  from  the  act  of  a  noisy 


Interest  ia  Lesson  Facts  1 1 1 

breaking",  now  from  shivering.  Discoiirage- 
incnt  and  despair  are  expressed  by  the  melt- 
ing of  the  heart,  y^^r  by  the  loosening  of  the 
reins.  Pride  is  portrayed  by  the  holding 
high  of  the  head,  with  the  figure  straight  and 
stifl.  Patience  is  a  long  breathing,  impatie?ice 
short  breathing,  desire  is  thirst  or  paleness. 
Pardon  is  expressed  by  a  throng  of  metaphors 
borrowed  from  the  idea  of  covering,  of  hid- 
ing, of  coating  over  the  fault.  In  Job  God 
sews  up  sins  in  a  sack,  seals  it,  then  throws 
it  behind  Him ;  all  to  signify  that  He  forgets 
them.  Other  more  or  less  abstract  ideas 
have  found  their  symbol  in  the  Semitic  lan- 
guages in  a  like  manner.  The  idea  of  beauty 
is  drawn  from  splendour,  that  of  good  from 
straightness,  that  of  evil  from  swerving  or 
the  curved  line,  or  from  stench.  To  create  is 
primitively  to  mould,  to  decide  is  to  cut,  to 
think  is  to  speak."  ^ 

The  great  truths  of  the  Bible  are  revealed 
in  the  lives  and  experiences  oi persons.  "  The 
Bible  should  be  studied,"  says  Dr.  Henry  H. 
Snyder,  in  "  Religious  Education,"  "  accord- 

'  Gardiner,  "The  Bible  as  English  Literature,"  p.  113. 


1 1 2  Capturing  the  Emotions 

ing  to  the  method  with  which  religious  truth  is 
presented  in  it.  This  method  is  not  theolog- 
ical, not  philosophical,  not  the  abstract  meth- 
ods of  a  text-book  on  ethics.  It  is  true  that  it 
deals  with  the  great  themes  out  of  which  the- 
ologies, philosophies,  and  systems  of  ethics 
have  grown — faith,  God,  righteousness,  sin, 
conduct,  character,  the  redemption  of  man, — 
themes  world  old  and  world  long,  and  inevi- 
tably fundamental  to  the  first  man  who  began 
to  think  about  himself,  his  place  in  the  uni- 
verse, his  destiny,  as  they  will  be  funda- 
mental to  the  last  man  who,  looking  before 
and  after,  strives  to  solve  the  problem  of  his 
own  narrow  span  as  well  as  the  problem  of 
the  larger  life  of  the  race.  The  Bible  is  frankly, 
directly  and  vitally  a  human  book,  and  its 
method  of  expressing  religious  truth  is  as  far 
from  the  abstract  as  the  man  that  josdes  you 
on  the  street  is  from  Pope's  '  Essay  on  Man.' 
"It  is  this  human,  this  personal  quality, 
this  embodying  of  the  supreme  truths  of  the 
religious  life  in  men  and  women  of  varying 
types  of  character  that  makes  a  study  of  it, 
from  this  point  of  view,  so  fruitful  of  religious 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  113 

value.  What  is  the  Bible,  what  is  it  that 
stands  out  from  its  pages,  gripping  thought, 
quickening  conscience,  and  stirring  religious 
sentiments?  Is  it  the  familiar  truths  that 
have  been  mentioned  ?  Yes,  to  be  sure  ;  but 
they  come  by  way  of  personalities, — of 
Moses,  of  Abraham,  of  Jacob,  of  Joseph,  of 
Samuel,  of  Saul,  of  David,  of  Peter,  of  Paul, 
of  Jesus.  Sympathetically  to  interpret  the 
meaning  of  such  lives,  to  discover  and  em- 
phasize the  forces  that  made  them  what  they 
were,  how  they  thought,  what  they  did,  to  rec- 
ognize the  human  power  with  which  each 
wrought  and  also  to  recognize  the  power 
not  himself  which  made  for  righteousness  in 
the  life  of  each— is  to  leave  a  deposit  of 
religious  values  in  the  mind  of  the  average 
student  of  far  more  significance  than  can  be 
had  from  a  text-book  on  ethics  or  morals.  All 
this  suggests  that  if  the  study  of  the  Bible  is 
to  be  of  distinctly  religious  value,  it  must  con- 
cern itself  with  the  study  of  personalities  pos- 
sessed by  religious  ideals  and  controlled  by 
the  religious  spirit."  ' 

1  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  V,  p.  57. 


114  Capturing  the  Emotions 

Again  the  Bible  is  an  intensely  dramatic 
book.  Its  narratives  are  full  of  movement 
and  thrilling  action.  Many  of  the  incidents 
could  with  but  little  change  be  thrown  into 
the  dramatic  form.  The  revelation  it  con- 
tains is  a  revelation  of  God  in  action,  and  in 
the  great  drama  of  redemption  we  are  shown 
the  way  of  salvation  and  God's  love  for  man- 
kind. 

These  five  simple  laws  of  interest :  famili- 
arity, novelty,  vividness,  personality,  and 
dramatic  action,  will  be  of 
A  Touchstone  great   practical   assistance   to 

the  teacher  in  the  preparation 
and  selection  of  the  lesson  material.  Keep- 
ing them  constantly  in  mind,  she  will  find 
many  things  in  the  lesson  helps  that  are  not 
available  for  her  class.  With  growing  skill 
she  will  learn  to  select  those  things  which  will 
not  only  attract  and  hold  the  attention,  but 
which  will  feed  and  nurture  the  mind  of  the 
pupil. 

We  proceed  now  to  consider  certain  other 
laws  of  interest  which  apply  more  especially 
to  the  presentation  of  the  lesson. 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  1 1 5 

All  feeling  is  contagious.     It  is  well  known 
how  rapidly  fear  will  spread  from  one  to  an- 
other in  an  army.     The  effect 
Contagion  which  a  chccrful  or  a  gloomy 

person  has  upon  those  about 
him,  the  influence  of  an  orator  over  his  audi- 
ence, the  power  of  a  great  general  to  inspire  his 
men  in  battle,  and  the  rapid  spread  of  emotion 
in  great  revivals  are  all  illustrations  of  this 
law.  The  teacher  who  would  awaken  emo- 
tion in  the  minds  of  her  pupils  in  the  teach- 
ing of  the  lesson  must  feel  it  herself.  To  be 
thoroughly  interested  yourself  is  the  first  es- 
sential to  interesting  others.  In  relating  a 
story,  or  using  an  illustration,  the  teacher 
who  does  not  feel  it  cannot  tell  it. 

If  the  experience  through  which  a  person 
in  the  lesson  passed  was  such  as  to  awaken 
emotion  in  him,  and  if  we  through  the 
sympathetic  imagination  enter  into  his  feel- 
ings, he  becomes  an  interesting  object  to  us. 
If  we  had  been  present  in  many  Bible  scenes, 
the  profound  emotions  of  those  participating 
in  them  would  have  been  communicated  to 
us.     But  we  can  by  an  effort  of  the  imagina- 


1 16  Capturing  the  Emotions 

tion  thus  put  ourselves  alongside  of  a  Bible 
character  and  share  his  emotion.  We  may 
go  further.  We  may  put  ourselves  in  his 
place  and  for  the  moment  feel  that  we  are 
passing  through  the  experience  and  share  in 
the  feeling  awakened  by  it.  When  the 
teacher  has  thus  in  imagination  put  herself 
in  close  touch  with  the  persons  in  the  lesson 
so  as  to  feel  their  emotions,  she  may  transfer 
them  to  the  pupil.  Just  in  proportion  to  the 
depth  and  force  of  the  emotional  appeal 
which  the  story  makes  to  her,  will  she  be 
able  to  bring  it  in  power  to  his  mind  and 
heart. 

In  this  law  we  see  a  reason  why  the  teacher 
must  get  into  close  touch  with  Jesus.  It  is 
.  part  of  her  work  to  pass  on 
wulTefuT  the  thoughts,  feelings,  plans, 

and  ideals  of  Jesus  to  her 
pupils.  Not  until  she  herself  has  thus  gotten 
into  close  fellowship  with  Him,  can  she  so 
hold  Him  before  the  class  that  He  will  make 
the  impression  that  He  ought  to  make  upon 
the  hearts  of  her  pupils. 

The  law  of  the  contagion  of  feeling  applies 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  117 

not  only  as  between  persons  but  as  between 
objects  and  ideas  presented  to  the  mind. 
When  an  idea  brings  with  it 
Association  a  strong  glow  of  intCFCst,  and 

another  idea  is  then  presented, 
the  feeling  will  quickly  spread  from  one  to 
the  other.  When  a  lesson  is  approached 
w-ith  a  good  illustration,  the  interest  aroused 
tends  to  continue  on  through  the  lesson.  By 
interspersing  such  illustrations  through  the 
lesson,  interest  may  thus  be  maintained  even 
where  the  subject  matter  would  otherwise  be 
dry  and  difficult  to  teach. 

So  when  a  truth  enters  the  mind  in  a  warm 
glow  of  emotion,  it  is  likely  that  when  the 
truth  is  afterwards  recalled,  some  of  the 
original  feeling  accompanying  it  will  also  be 
awakened.  If  we  can  capture  the  emotions 
in  teaching  a  lesson  truth,  we  increase  the 
probability  of  that  truth  influencing  the  future 
acts  and  choices  of  the  pupil. 

When  emotion  becomes  associated  with  an 
object,  it  may  become  a  permanent  interest 
to  the  person.  Each  person,  as  we  have 
seen,  starts  with  a  few  natural  or  inherited 


Il8  Capturing  the  Emotions 

interests.     Very  early  in  life  we  begin  to  add 
to  these  through  the  association  of  new  objects 

and  ideas  with  old  objects  and 
fntcTe^s'tr*  ideas   possessing  this  power. 

So  we  go  on  all  through  life 
acquiring  new  interests.  Thus  each  person, 
through  his  own  experience,  comes  to  have 
his  own  peculiar  interests.  They  are  hidden 
away  in  the  depths  of  his  own  mind,  and  he 
may  not  speak  of  them  to  others.  The 
teacher  in  presenting  the  lesson  facts  or  re- 
lating illustrations,  may  touch  one  of  these 
secret  springs  and  a  quick  glow  of  interest  is 
the  result  which  is  communicated  to  the  les- 
son, and  it  may  be  that  all  unconsciously  to 
the  teacher  a  bond  is  formed  between  the 
pupil's  former  experience  and  the  new  lesson 
which  will  have  an  influence  upon  his  future 
life.  It  is  evident  that  the  more  intimately 
the  teacher  is  acquainted  with  the  pupil,  the 
easier  it  will  be  for  her  thus  to  touch  the  per- 
sonal interests  of  the  pupil. 

Under  proper  conditions  interest  ac- 
companies self-activity.  One  psychologist 
(Dewey)   has   declared   his  belief   that  "the 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  i  19 

emotions  are  the  reflex  of  actions."  It  is  cer- 
tainly true  that  there  is  a  close  connection 
between  action  and  feeling. 
Self-Activity  This  law  is  subject,  however, 

to  the  following  qualifications : 

I.  There  must  be  ease  in  doing  the  task. 
The  sense  of  effort  is  like  friction  in  nature ; 
it  hinders  and  retards  the  action  and  if  too 
great  destroys  the  pleasure  in  it.  Interest  is 
not  usually  present  at  the  beginning  of  a 
work.  Not  until  the  mind  and  body  have 
gotten  into  full  swing  does  the  sense  of  effort 
disappear  and  pleasure  and  interest  awaken. 
A  recent  book  on  "How  to  Study"  has  a 
chapter  with  the  suggestive  title  "  The  Agony 
of  Beginning." 

The  beginning  of  the  lesson  is  therefore  a 
critical  moment.  The  teacher's  problem  is 
how  to  overcome  the  natural  inertia  of  the 
mind,  the  friction,  the  sense  of  effort  that  is 
almost  sure  to  be  present  at  first.  This  is 
the  point  where  she  must  be  ready  with  the 
map,  the  diagram,  the  picture,  the  story  or 
the  illustration  which  will  catch  the  attention 
and  start  the  mind  of  the  pupil  to  working. 


120  Capturing  the  Emotions 

2.  There  must  be  freedom  in  doing  the 
work.  We  do  not  enjoy  working  under  the 
control  of  others.  We  Hke  to  do  things  in 
our  own  way,  to  exercise  our  own  powers  of 
initiative  and  construction,  and  to  use  our 
own  wits  in  the  solving  of  problems  and 
overcoming  of  difficulties. 

3.  There  must  be  adaptation  of  the  task 
to  our  powers.  We  do  not  take  an  interest 
in  a  task  that  is  beyond  our  powers.  Here 
is  the  secret  of  failure  in  the  teaching  of 
many  lessons.  Where  the  lessons  are  not 
graded,  they  are  apt  to  be  too  difficult  for 
the  mind  of  the  pupil  to  grasp.  Making  the 
attempt  and  finding  it  beyond  him,  attention 
and  interest  both  relax,  and  his  mind  flies  off 
to  other  things. 

Subject  to  these  qualifications,  this  law  runs 
all  through  life.  Watch  a  ten-year-old  boy 
at  his  play  and  see  how  hard  he  will  work  at 
making  a  tent,  or  sand  fort,  or  in  building  a 
dam,  or  in  playing  a  game  of  ball. 

Many  Sunday-schools  are  introducing  what 
are  called  "  manual  methods "  of  teaching. 
The   boys  and   girls  in  the  Junior    Depart- 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  12 1 

ment  are  put  to  work  cutting  out  and  pasting 
pictures,  illustrating  hymns,  making  and  col- 
ouring maps,  writing  out  the 
^^"''^'  lesson   story  into    note-books 

Methods  •' 

with  lettering  and  sketches, 
etc.  These  all  make  their  appeal  to  this  law. 
Interest  is  very  marked  in  self-expression. 
Of  course  all  self-activity  is  in  a  sense  self- 
expression,  but  reference  is 
seif-Expression  now  made  to  sclf-cxpression 
in  language.  We  enjoy  the 
story  we  tell  ourselves.  Every  speaker 
knows  the  fascination  of  giving  expression 
to  his  ideas  and  feelings  before  an  audience. 
It  is  a  frequent  criticism  of  teachers  that  they 
talk  too  much.  The  very  act  of  giving  ex- 
pression to  what  they  have  learned  about  the 
lesson  awakens  keen  interest  in  them.  The 
teacher  should  not  try  to  teach  too  much  but 
aim  to  give  the  pupil  time  to  think  and  to 
express  his  thoughts.  Even  though  she  does 
not  get  through  the  lesson,  or  give  out 
everything  she  has  learned,  far  more  will  be 
learned  by  the  pupil  and  he  will  take  greater 
interest   in   it   and   remember   it  better,   be- 


122  Capturing  the  Emotions 

cause  of  the  part  he  has  taken  in  what  is 
taught. 

Two   other  phases   of  interest  which  are 
more  difficult  of  appHcation  to  lesson  teach- 
ing may  be  mentioned  here 
ourlefveT  bccausc  of  their  influence  upon 

our  lives.  We  are  each  of  us 
interested  in  our  own  persons  and  everything 
connected  with  them.  We  are  interested  in 
our  clothes  because  of  their  association  with 
ourselves.  The  reason  that  home  is  so  dear 
to  us  is  because  of  the  many  things  there  that 
have  thus  been  associated  with  our  experi- 
ence. The  old  clock  on  the  mantelpiece,  the 
picture  on  the  wall,  the  old  armchair,  the 
well,  the  path  through  the  meadow,  the  little 
red  schoolhouse,  old  school-books,  and  other 
books  that  have  entered  into  our  lives  and 
become  closely  associated  with  our  person- 
alities :  how  dear  do  they  become  to  us,  and 
how  deeply  are  memories  of  them  engraven 
upon  our  hearts ! 

Especially  are  we  interested  in  the  play  of 
our  own  inner  life.  Of  that  wonderful  drama 
we  never  grow  weary.     In  his  fine  essay  on 


Interest  in  Lesson  Facts  123 

"  The  Lantern  Bearers,"  Robert  Louis  Steven- 
son tells  of  how  when  he  was  a  boy  in  Scot- 
land at  certain  seasons  of  the 
h!l'efLifr°^''''  year,  each  of  the  boys  would 
purchase  a  tin  bull's-eye  lan- 
tern. When  the  nights  were  black  they 
would  sally  forth,  each  with  a  tin  lantern 
buckled  to  his  belt  and  over  it  a  buttoned  top- 
coat. "  They  smelled  noisomely  of  blistered 
tin  ;  they  never  burned  aright ;  their  use  was 
naught,  yet  a  boy  with  a  tin  lantern  asked 
for  nothing  more.  It  was  the  essence  of  bliss 
to  walk  by  yourself  in  the  black  night,  the 
slide  shut,  the  top-coat  buttoned,  not  a  ray 
escaping,  a  mere  pillar  in  the  dark ;  and  all 
the  while  deep  down  in  the  privacy  of  your 
fool's  heart  to  know  you  had  a  bull's-eye  at 
your  belt  and  to  exult  and  sing  over  the 
knowledge.  ...  It  has  been  said  that  a 
poet  died  young  in  the  breast  of  the  most 
stolid.  It  may  be  contended  rather  that  this 
(somewhat  minor)  bard  in  almost  every  case 
survives,  and  is  the  spice  of  life  to  his  pos- 
sessor. Justice  is  not  done  to  the  unplumbed 
childishness  of  man's  imagination.     His  life 


124  Capturing  the  Emotions 

from  without  may  seem  but  a  rude  mound  of 
mud,  there  will  be  some  golden  chamber  at 
the  heart  of  it  in  which  he  dwells  delighted ; 
and  for  as  dark  as  his  pathway  seems  to  an 
observer,  he  will  have  some  kind  of  a  bull's- 
eye  at  his  belt."  ^ 

By  the  contagion  of  her  own  feeling,  by 
association  between  the  facts  to  be  presented 
and  ideas  naturally  interesting  to  the  pupil,  or 
of  peculiar  interest  to  him,  by  enlisting  his 
activity,  by  giving  him  the  opportunity  for 
and  leading  him  to  self-expression,  the  skill- 
ful teacher  in  the  presentation  of  lesson  facts 
will  awaken  a  response  in  feeling  and  lead 
up  to  the  capture  of  the  rampart  of  the  emo- 
tions. 

*"  Across  the  Plains,"  p.  213. 


XII 

INTEREST  IN  LESSON  TRUTHS 

THE  laws  of  interest  thus  far  con- 
sidered relate  more  particularly  to 
the  lesson  facts  and  illustrations. 
We  come  now  to  the  question  as  to  what  will 
make  a  lesson  truth  an  object  of  interest  to 
the  pupil.  It  is  well  known  that  the  search 
for  truth  may  become  an  absorbing  passion 
in  the  lives  of  men.  We  are  now  to  try  and 
discover  why  and  when  we  may  expect  that  a 
lesson  truth  will  awaken  interest  in  the  pupil. 
There  is  a  large  class  of  interests  which 
spring  from  the  desire  to  explain  the  un- 
known and  the  mysterious. 
fnt^M?*^*  "  Speculative  interest  inquires 

into  the  relations  and  casual 
connections  of  phenomena.  It  is  not  satisfied 
with  the  simple  play  of  variety,  but  seeks  for 

the  genesis  and  outcome  of  things.     It  traces 
125 


J  26  Capturing  the  Emotions 

out  similarities  and  sequences  and  detects 
law  and  unity  in  nature.  In  fact  it  leads  to 
science  or  classified  knowledge.  Even  a  child 
may  be  eager  to  know  how  a  squirrel  climbs 
a  tree,  or  cracks  a  nut ;  where  it  stores  its 
winter  food  ;  and  how  its  nest  is  built ;  its 
manner  of  life  in  winter  and  summer ;  why  a 
mole  can  burrow  underground  ;  how  it  is 
possible  for  a  fish  to  breathe  under  water."  * 
So  a  great  many  things  about  the  unknown, 
the  unseen,  the  mysterious  are  revealed  in  the 
Bible.  It  contains  the  answers  to  life's  hard- 
est questions,  the  explanation  of  its  deepest 
mysteries.  The  teacher  can  make  constant 
appeal  to  this  law  of  interest  in  the  presenta- 
tion of  lesson  truths.  The  interest  with  which 
an  adult  class  will  discuss  "foreordination," 
"predestination,"  and  similar  hard  doctrines  is 
an  illustration  of  this  law  of  interest.  The 
ability  of  a  child  to  ask  questions  which  a 
learned  scientist  cannot  answer  is  well  known. 
A  lesson  truth  may  be  interesting  because 
of  its  relation  to  our  needs.  All  our  needs 
are    interesting   to   us,  and  there  are  times 

'  McMurry,  "  Elements  of  General  Method,"  p.  112. 


Interest  in  Lesson  Truths  127 

when    the    interest    becomes   painful   in   its 
intensity.     The  truths  of  the  Bible  answer  to 

our  simplest  and  smallest  as 
NeedB  well   as   to   our   highest   and 

deepest  needs.  They  point 
out  to  us  the  way  in  which  those  needs  may 
be  met.  When  we  are  oppressed  with  a  sense 
of  our  weakness,  many  Bible  verses  point  us 
to  the  source  of  strength,  and  His  willingness 
to  give  us  help.  When  conscience  is  aroused 
and  a  sense  of  sin  weighs  upon  our  hearts, 
the  Bible  tells  us  of  the  way  of  salvation,  and 
of  how  we  may  escape  from  the  guilt  and 
power  of  sin.  When,  facing  the  hard  prob- 
lems of  life,  we  feel  our  ignorance,  the  Bible 
has  much  to  tell  us  of  wisdom  and  where  it 
may  be  found. 

In  his  study  of  the  **  Psychology  of  Re- 
ligion," Prof.  J.  B.  Pratt  has  a  chapter  on  the 

"  Value  of  God,"  in  which  he 
The "  Value  of  God "  quotcs   largely  from  answers 

to  a  list  of  questions  which  he 
sent  out  to  various  persons  on  the  subject  of 
their  religion.  Commenting  on  these  an- 
swers, he    says :  "  People   are  chiefly  inter- 


128  Capturing  the  Emotions 

ested  not  in  what  God  is  but  in  what  He  can 
do.  Two-thirds  of  my  respondents  describe 
Him  as  '  Father/  *  Friend,'  the  *  ally  of  my 
ideals'  and  equivalent  expressions.  Pro- 
fessor Leuba  seems  to  be  right  in  the  main 
when  he  says,  '  God  is  used  rather  than  un- 
derstood.' The  religious  consciousness  cares 
little  who  God  is  but  wants  to  use  Him  for 
various  ends.  ...  It  would  be  a  mis- 
take to  suppose  that  the  ends  for  which  the 
religious  consciousness  wishes  to  use  God 
are  chiefly  utilitarian  ends,  such  as  protector, 
meat  purveyor,  etc.  .  .  .  Most  people 
want  God  for  the  same  reason  that  they  want 
friends.  God's  relation  to  them  is  exactly 
that  of  a  very  dear,  a  very  lovable,  a  very 
sympathizing  friend.  .  .  .  The  God  whom 
most  people  want  and  whom  many  people 
have  is  a  very  real  and  sympathizing  friend. 
Like  other  friends  He  is  to  be  sure  not  only 
an  end  in  Himself,  but  a  means  to  other  ends. 
He  can  help  one  to  many  things  that  one 
wants.  These  things  are  as  a  rule  not  ma- 
terial benefits.  They  are  chiefly  of  three 
kinds:  Comfort  in  trouble,  hope  for  the  fu- 


Interest  in  Lesson  Truths  129 

ture,  and  assistance  in  striving  after  right- 
eousness." ' 

Our  desires  may  or  may  not  be  the  same 
as  our  needs,  but  they   are  always  objects 

of  interest  to  us.  There  are 
Desires  many  things  which  each  of  us 

would  like  to  possess,  to  be 
and  to  do.  Children  have  many  ardent  de- 
sires. The  teacher  will  recall  many  things 
about  which  her  longings  and  day-dreams 
clustered  as  a  child.  Some  of  these  were 
perhaps  peculiar  to  her  ;  others  were  similar 
to  the  longings  and  desires  of  other  children. 
A  lesson  truth  which  relates  itself  to  our  de- 
sires will  at  once  become  interesting. 

Closely  connected  with  our  needs  and  our 
desires   are  our    hopes  which   also   possess 

deep  interest  to  us.  The  les- 
HopcB  son  which  relates  itself  to  our 

hopes  and  gives  us  promise 
of  their  realization  will  at  once  take  on  a 
glow  of  interest.  The  hope  of  immortality 
in  the  Gospel  is  one  of  the  causes  of  its  ap- 
peal to  men.     When  a  dear  friend  is  taken 

1  Op.  cit.,  p.  263  ff. 


130  Capturing  the  Emotions 

from  us,  with  what  deep  interest  do  we  turn 
to  those  chapters  of  the  Bible  in  which  the 
immortal  hope  burns  brightest. 

When   need,  desire    and  hope  crystallize 
into  definite  plans,  purposes  and  ideals,  then 

a  lesson  truth  which  relates 
Purpose  itself  to  thosc  plans,  purposes 

and  ideals  becomes  of  great 
interest. 

This  form  of  interest  has  been  called  in- 
direct interest.     It  is  not  an  interest  in  the 

thing  itself,  but  the  interest 
Indirect  Interest       ariscs  becausc  of  the  place  a 

thing  has  in  the  accomplish- 
ment of  a  desire  or  purpose.  But  though 
only  indirect  it  is  a  form  of  interest  that  has 
a  powerful  influence  upon  life.  It  is  shown 
in  the  way  pupils  will  work  for  a  prize  or  re- 
ward, to  win  the  head  of  the  class,  to  make  a 
good  record,  etc.  All  the  various  methods 
used  in  the  Sunday-school  to  secure  regular 
attendance  and  the  like  make  their  appeal  to 
this  form  of  interest.  In  business  and  daily 
life  it  is  amazing  to  see  the  toil  and  drudgery 
that  men  will  endure  and  the  interest  which 


Interest  in  Lesson  Truths  131 

they  will  take  in  things  in  themselves  ugly, 
painful  and  unattractive,  because  of  their 
connection  with  the  plans  and  purposes  of 
life. 

It  is  a  part  of  the  teacher's  work  to  help 
the  pupil  to  form  high  ideals  and  to  lead  him 

to  form  the  purpose  of  giving 
Ideals  his  life  to  the  service  of  Christ. 

When  such  ideals  and  purpose 
have  once  been  formed,  then  the  Bible  will 
become  a  source  of  permanent  interest  to 
him.  It  is  full  of  truths  concerning  life's 
highest  ideal,  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  on 
every  page  it  spurs  us  on  to  the  work  of  at- 
taining that  ideal  in  our  own  lives,  and  bring- 
ing it  to  realization  in  the  world. 


XIII 

INDUCTION 

WE  have  seen   that   all  knowledge 
consists  of  either  individual  notions 
or    general    notions.      Individual 
notions  we  have  identified  with  the  facts  of 
the  Bible  lesson  ;  the  general  notion  is  that 
element  of  the  lesson  which  is 
^0*^*  GeneJaf '''''^"''   commott  to  a  large  number  of 
individual  notions,  or  groups 
of  individual  notions. 

General  notions  are  the  goal  of  all  our 
study.  They  are  so  for  many  reasons : 
They  are  necessary  to  our 
use  of  Genera.  thinking  J  they  are  of  great 
help  to  us  in  expressing 
thought ;  they  enable  us  to  classify  our 
knowledge  and  use  it  readily  ;  they  furnish  us 
with  guides  to  action  in  the  daily  affairs  of 

life ;  and  they  are  a  great  help  in  acquiring 
132 


Induction  1 33 

new  knowledge.  "  Each  concept  (general 
notion)  means  a  particular  kind  of  thing,  and 
as  things  seem  once  for  all  to  have  been 
created  in  kinds,  a  far  more  efficient  handling 
of  a  given  bit  of  experience  begins  as  soon  as 
we  have  classed  the  various  parts  of  it. 
Once  classed,  a  thing  can  be  treated  by  the 
law  of  its  class,  and  the  advantages  are  end- 
less. Both  theoretically  and  practically  this 
power  of  framing  abstract  concepts  is  one  of 
the  sublimest  of  our  human  prerogatives. 
We  come  back  into  the  concrete  from  our 
journey  into  these  abstractions  with  an  in- 
crease both  of  vision  and  power."  ^  These 
reasons  apply  to  all  classes  of  general  notions. 
But  in  addition  to  these,  the  general  truths  of 
the  Bible  have  an  especial  value  in  the  devel- 
opment of  character  and  in  aiding  the  human 
soul  to  attain  the  chief  purpose  for  which 
God  has  created  it.  In  bringing  to  light  the 
fundamental  truths  which  lie  imbedded  in  the 
lesson  facts,  and  lodging  them  firmly  in  the 
mind  of  the  pupil,  the  teacher  is  laying  direct 
siege  to  his  will,  and  giving  him  that  which 

'  James,  "  A  Pluralistic  Universe,"  p.  217. 


1^4         Laying  Siege  to  the  Reason 

will  be  of  the  greatest  assistance  to  him  in 
the  formation  of  his  character. 

Having  gotten  the  lesson  facts  thoroughly 
in  her  mind,  the  teacher  is  ready  to  select  the 

lesson  truth.  We  have  al- 
TesSrut;  ready   suggested    that    ordi- 

narily  one  truth  to  the  lesson 
will  be  all  that  the  teacher  will  have  time  to 
teach.  In  many  of  the  lessons  there  will  be 
a  number  of  these  truths  that  will  stand  out 
in  the  facts  when  the  teacher  has  meditated 
upon  them  for  a  sufficient  length  of  time,  and 
when  she  has  asked  herself  the  question  : 
What  is  there  in  this  lesson  that  is  just  as  true 
to-day  as  it  was  when  these  events  took 
place?  What  is  the  general,  universal, 
eternal  element  in  this  lesson  ?  When  a 
number  of  truths  thus  appear,  the  teacher 
will  have  to  make  a  selection  from  among 
them,  taking  that  one  which  is  best  suited  to 
the  needs  of  the  class,  and  having  reference 
to  other  truths  taught  in  previous  lessons. 

When  the  lesson  facts  have  been  presented 
to  the  class,  the  next  step  is  the  summing  of 
them  up  in  a  generalization.     This  may  be 


Induction  135 

done  in  several  ways.     It  is  often  a  wise  plan 
for   the  teacher  to  state  the   general   truth 

which  she  aims  to  teach  at 
IZTt':!'         the     commencement    of    the 

lesson.  This  will  help  to  keep 
her  from  wandering  too  far  afield,  and  will 
tend  to  keep  the  main  thought  in  mind  all 
through  the  lesson.  Whether  the  truth  is 
thus  actually  stated  or  not,  the  teacher  should 
have  it  clearly  in  mind  so  that  she  could  if 
necessary  state  it  at  any  time  during  the 
teaching  of  the  lesson.  Again  it  will  often 
be  wise  to  have  the  pupil  state  the  lesson 
truth  in  his  own  words  as  it  appears  to  him 
in  the  teaching.  There  is  a  pleasure  in  dis- 
covering for  one's  self  the  truth  of  the  lesson 
and  stating  it  to  others  of  which  the  pupil 
ought  not  to  be  deprived.  If  the  lesson  is 
skillfully  taught  with  some  fundamental  re- 
ligious truth  in  view,  the  pupil  will  usually 
have  no  difficulty  in  stating  it. 

When  the  central  truth  is  thus  discovered 
and  pointed  out  by  the  pupil  or  stated  by  the 
teacher,  it  should  then  be  summed  up 
and  stated  in  some  verse  of  Scripture.     This 


136         Laying  Siege  to  the  Reason 

can  almost   always  be  done.     The  Bible  is 
full  of  texts  which  thus  sum  up  in  a  concise 
manner  and  in  beautiful  and 
sJiptlre  sublime  language   the  essen- 

tial truths  of  religion.  Some- 
times it  will  be  well  to  use  a  number  of 
different  verses  all  of  which  may  express 
the  same  truth  in  slightly  different  words. 
This  is  the  place  for  the  Golden  Text,  if  it 
suits  the  truth  which  the  teacher  has  selected. 
Often,  however,  the  teacher  will  not  care  to 
use  the  Golden  Text,  because  it  does  not  ex- 
press the  particular  truth  she  wishes  to  bring 
out.  This  is  the  place  for  Bible  drills  on 
verses  of  Scripture  which  thus  sum  up  the 
lesson  teaching.  These  Bible  verses  should 
be  frequently  reviewed  so  that  the  pupil  may 
in  time  acquire  a  large  number  of  such  texts, 
and  so  that  they  may  be  readily  recalled  in 
future  lessons  which  may  teach  the  same 
truths. 

The  method  of  study  here  advocated  is  what 
is  called  the  inductive  method :  the  study  of 
facts  and  the  drawing  of  inferences  from 
those  facts.     It  is  the  method  which  has  led 


Induction  137 

to  such  wonderful  discoveries  in  science  and 
which  has  done  so  much  for  the  progress  of 

the  world  since  it  was  first  pro- 
induction  mulgated  in  its  modern  form 

by  Lord  Bacon.  The  very  re- 
verse of  this  method  is  in  use  in  many  Sun- 
day-school classes  where,  instead  of  studying- 
the  facts  to  discover  one  truth,  the  teacher 
endeavours  to  see  how  many  truths  can  be 
drawn  from  a  single  verse,  or  even  a  single 
clause  of  Scripture. 


XIV 

DEDUCTION 

IN  laying  siege  to  the  reason  the  teacher's 
task  is  not  finished  when  she  has  lodged 
the  lesson  truth  in  his  mind.  The  draw- 
ing of  a  general  truth  from  a  group  of  facts 
is  only  the  first  step  in  the  reasoning  process. 
When  we  have  acquired  knowledge  of  a 
general  notion,  we  next  proceed  to  reason 
from  it  back  to  individual  cases  again. 
When  a  teacher  has  taught  a  class  a  rule  in 
arithmetic,  she  gives  the  pupils  a  number  of 
examples  to  work  out  in  order  that  they  may 
learn  how  to  apply  the  rule  to  new  problems 
as  they  arise.  So  when  the  teacher  of  a  Bi- 
ble lesson  has  drawn  out  the  lesson  truth 
and  presented  it  to  the  mind  of  the  pupil,  she 
may  next  proceed  to  show  how  the  truth 
may  be  used  in  daily  life.  This  process  of 
reasoning  from    generals    to   particulars   is 

called  "  Deduction."    In  Sunday-school  teach- 

138 


Deduction  139 

ing  it  is  usually  called  *'  making  the  applica- 
tion," or  pointing  the  moral,  or  showing  the 
practical  lesson.  The  phrase  "  pointing  the 
moral"  applies  more  particularly  to  truths 
drawn  from  human  conduct.  From  specific 
instances  of  right  or  wrong  conduct  we  draw 
general  truths  which  we  apply  to  the  pupil's 
conduct,  by  way  of  example  or  warning.  It 
is  to  be  feared  that  this  kind  of  Sunday- 
school  teaching  has  been  very  much  over- 
done. Being  impressed  with  the  importance 
of  right  conduct  on  the  part  of  the  pupil,  the 
teacher  loses  no  opportunity  to  point  out  to 
the  pupil  the  duties  which  he  owes  to  God 
and  his  fellows.  Thus  facts  and  truths  may 
be  slurred  over  in  haste  to  talk  about  the 
lesson  duties. 

There  are  dangers  in  thus  "  pointing  the 
moral "  against  which  the  teacher  must 
guard.  One  is  that  the  pupil 
i^gThJiwJrar"'"^"  =^ay  plainly  see  the  moral 
himself,  and  therefore  he  does 
not  need  to  have  it  pointed  out  to  him. 
When  the  moral  is  so  plain  as  not  to  need 
stating,   the   pupil    may    rather   resent  such 


1 40         Laying  Siege  to  the  Reason 

statement  by  the  teacher  as  being  an  insult 
to  his  intelligence.  Even  little  children  may 
see  the  bearing  of  a  story  upon  their  own 
conduct  without  always  being  told  that  the 
awful  fate  which  overtook  the  bad  little  boy 
will  surely  be  theirs  if  they  are  not  good,  or 
that  they  can  win  the  lovely  reward  which 
the  good  little  boy  got,  if  they  will  only  be- 
have like  him.  Often  when  a  good  lesson 
has  impressed  its  own  moral  its  effect  will 
only  be  weakened  by  the  teacher  stating  it. 
Again  a  teacher  who  invariably  draws  the 
moral  of  the  lesson  will  quite  likely  be  guilty 
of  tiresome  repetition.  The  lines  of  conduct 
which  the  pupil  should  follow  can  only  be 
pointed  out  in  a  general  and  vague  way,  and 
when  we  have  been  told  with  tiresome  itera- 
tion that  we  ought  to  be  good,  that  we  ought 
to  love  father  and  mother,  that  we  ought  to 
be  obedient  to  teacher,  or  we  ought  to  do 
this  or  not  do  that,  the  injunctions  are  apt  to 
lose  their  force,  and  to  fall  on  unheeding 
ears  at  last. 

On  the  other  hand  it  would  be  a  mistake 
to   omit  the  application  of  the  lesson  alto- 


Deduction  14 1 

gether.  There  are  many  injunctions  to  con- 
duct  in   the  Bible.     In  the  Epistles  of  Paul, 

the  statements  of  religious 
EntVreiy'°"'""''     ^ruths  are  always  followed  by 

injunctions  to  conduct.  The 
connection  between  them  is  always  close. 
It  is  in  the  glow  of  emotion  aroused  by  the 
apprehension  of  a  great  truth  that  Paul 
passes  on  to  urge  the  conduct  which  should 
follow  the  knowledge  of  the  truth.  But  we 
do  not  find  any  tiresome  repetitions  of  such 
injunctions  to  conduct  The  proper  time  to 
point  the  moral  and  the  time  to  omit  it  must 
be  left  to  the  wisdom  and  tact  of  the  teacher. 
Her  knowledge  of  the  life  and  needs  of  the 
pupil  will  help  her  to  judge  what  is  best  to 
do.  Often  she  may  speak  a  word  of  exhor- 
tation or  of  warning  which  may  come  just  at 
the  right  time  to  be  of  great  influence  on  the 
life  of  the  pupil.  The  better  she  understands 
him  and  the  closer  the  fellowship  between 
them  the  easier  will  it  be  for  her  to  know 
when  to  speak  and  when  to  keep  silent.  As 
a  rule  it  may  be  said  that  the  more  skillfully 
the  lesson  is  taught,  and  the  deeper  the  im- 


1 42         Laying  Siege  to  tiie  Reason 

pression  it  makes,  the  less  need  there  will  be 
for  making  the  application. 

Especially  should  the  teacher  study  most 
earnestly    and    prayerfully    the  question  of 

when  and  how  to  point  out  to 
Decision  for  Christ    the  pupil  his  duty  to  take  the 

great  step  of  public  confession 
of  faith  in  Christ.  There  are  some  teachers 
who  believe  that  this  should  be  done  in  every 
lesson.  The  vv^isdom  of  this  must  be  seriously 
doubted.  It  is  subject  to  the  danger  above 
pointed  out  of  losing  its  effectiveness  by 
frequent  repetition.  When  the  teacher  is 
cautious  and  tactful  in  pointing  the  moral, 
and  does  not  do  it  too  frequently,  it  will  come 
with  all  the  greater  power  when  she  does  take 
an  opportunity  which  arises  naturally  out  of 
the  lesson  to  press  home  his  duty  upon  him. 
There  is  a  way  in  which  the  teacher  may 
make  the  application  of  the  lesson  which  is 

not  subject  to  the  dangers 
t?a«oTs'"*""         above  mentioned,  and  that  is 

by  giving  concrete  illustra- 
tions of  how  some  person  has  used  the  truth 
and   put  it  into  life  and  action,  and  thus  by 


Deduction  143 

the  power  of  imitation  and  example,  rather 
than  by  direct  exhortation,  leading  the  pupil 
to  form  moral  judgments  and  act  upon  them. 
This  is  what  is  meant  by  the  saying,  "  Ex- 
ample is  better  than  precept." 

Let  the  teacher  ponder  well  these  wise 
words  from  one  of  our  leading  pubhc  school 
educators,  Dr.  Charles  A.  Mc- 
Professor  McMurry  Murry,  in  "  Elements  of  Gen- 
eral Method":  "The  rela- 
tions of  persons  to  each  other  in  society  give 
rise  to  morals.  How  ?  The  act  of  a  person 
— as  when  a  fireman  rescues  a  child  from  a 
burning  building — shows  a  disposition  in  the 
actor.  We  praise  or  condemn  this  disposi- 
tion as  the  deed  is  good  or  bad.  But  each 
moral  judgment  given  with  honesty  and  feel- 
ing leaves  the  child  stronger.  .  .  .  To 
study  the  conduct  of  persons  as  illustrating 
right  actions  is,  in  quality,  the  highest  form 
of  instruction.  .  .  .  Moral  ideas  spring 
out  of  experience  with  persons  either  in  real 
life  or  in  the  books  we  read.  Examples  of 
moral  action  drawn  from  life  are  the  only 
things  that  can  give  meaning  to  moral  pre- 


144         Laying  Siege  to  the  Reason 

cepts.  If  we  see  a  harsh  man  beating  his 
horse,  we  get  an  ineffaceable  impression  of 
harshness.  By  reading  the  story  of  '  Black 
Beauty  '  we  acquire  a  lifetime  sympathy  for 
animals.  Moral  ideas  have  always  a  con- 
crete basis  or  origin.  Some  companion  with 
whose  feelings  and  actions  you  are  in  close 
personal  contact,  or  some  character  from  his- 
tory or  fiction  by  whose  personality  you  have 
been  strongly  attracted,  gives  you  your  keen- 
est impressions  of  moral  qualities.  To  be- 
gin with  abstract  moral  teaching  or  to  put 
faith  in  it  is  to  misunderstand  children.  In 
morals  as  in  other  forms  of  knowledge,  chil- 
dren are  overwhelmingly  interested  in  per- 
sonal and  individual  examples,  things  which 
have  form,  colour,  action.  The  attempt  to 
sum  up  the  important  truths  of  a  subject  and 
present  them  as  abstractions  to  children  is 
almost  certain  to  be  a  failure  pedagogically 
considered. 

"  A  litde  reflection  will  show  that  we  are 
only  demanding  object  lessons  in  the  field  of 
moral  education,  extensive,  systematic  object 
lessons ;    choice    experiences,    and   episodes 


Deduction  1 45 

from  human  life,  simple,  clear,  painted  in  nat- 
ural colours  as  shown  by  our  best  history  and 
literature.  To  appreciate  virtues  and  vices, 
to  sympathize  with  better  impulses,  we  must 
travel  beyond  words  and  definitions  till  we 
come  in  contact  with  the  personal  deeds 
that  first  gave  rise  to  them.  The  life  of  Mar- 
tin Luther  with  its  faults  and  merits  honestly 
represented  is  a  powerful  moral  tonic  to  the 
reader ;  the  autobiography  of  Franklin  brings 
out  a  great  variety  of  homely  truths  in  the 
form  of  interesting  episodes  in  his  career; 
Adam  Bede  and  Romola  impress  us  more 
powerfully  and  permanently  than  the  best 
sermons,  because  the  individual  realism  in 
them  leads  to  unequalled  vividness  of  moral 
judgment  upon  their  acts.  King  Lear 
teaches  us  the  folly  of  rash  judgments  with 
overwhelming  force.  Evangeline  awakens 
our  sympathies  as  no  moralist  ever  dreamed 
of  doing.  Uncle  Tom,  in  Mrs.  Stowe's  story, 
was  a  stronger  preacher  than  Wendell 
Phillips.  William  Tell,  in  Schiller's  play, 
kindles  our  love  for  heroic  deeds  into  enthu- 
siasm.     The   best   myths,  histories,   biogra- 


146         Laying  Siege  to  the  Reason 

phies,  novels  and  dramas  are  the  richest 
sources  of  moral  stimulus  because  they  lead 
us  into  the  immediate  presence  of  those  men 
and  women  whose  deeds  stir  up  our  moral 
natures.  In  the  presentations  of  the  masters 
we  are  in  the  presence  of  moral  ideas  clothed 
in  flesh  and  blood,  real  and  yet  idealized. 
Generosity  is  not  a  name,  but  the  act  of  a 
person  which  wins  our  interest  and  favour. 
To  get  the  impress  of  kindness  we  must  see 
an  act  of  kindness  and  feel  the  glow  it  pro- 
duces. When  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  wounded 
on  the  battle-field  and  suffering  with  thirst, 
reached  out  his  hand  for  a  cup  of  water  that 
was  brought,  his  glance  fell  upon  a  dying 
soldier  who  viewed  the  cup  with  great  de- 
sire ;  Sidney  handed  him  the  water  with  the 
words,  *  Thy  necessity  is  greater  than  mine.' 
No  one  can  refuse  his  approval  for  this  act. 
After  telling  the  story  of  the  man  who  went 
down  to  Jericho  and  fell  among  thieves,  and 
then  of  the  priest,  the  Levite  and  the  Samaritan 
who  passed  that  way,  Jesus  put  the  question 
to  His  critic,  '  Who  was  neighbour  to  him 
that  fell  among  thieves  ? '      And  the  answer 


Deduction  147 

came  with  unwilling  lips»  '  He  that  showed 
mercy.'  .  .  .  On  the  other  hand  it  is 
natural  to  condemn  wrong  deeds  when  pre- 
sented clearly  and  objectively  in  the  action 
of  another.  .  .  .  When  Columbus  was 
thrown  into  chains  instead  of  being  re- 
warded, we  condemn  the  Spaniards.  In  the 
same  way  the  real  world  of  persons  about  us, 
the  acts  of  parents,  companions  and  teachers, 
are  powerful  in  giving  good  and  bad  tone  to 
our  sentiments,  because  as  living  object  les- 
sons their  impress  is  directly  and  constantly 
upon  us."  ' 

As  the  teacher  must  give  careful  thought  to 
the  beginning  of  the  lesson,  so  she  must  plan 
its  close.  She  should  search  her  own  mem- 
ory, the  lesson  helps,  newspapers,  magazines 
and  books,  to  find  the  best  possible  concrete 
illustrations  of  the  truth  which  she  wishes  to 
drive  home.     A  good  illustra- 

Plannine  the  Close       .  •  .  i 

of  a  Lesson  tiott  may  evcn  turn  a  poorly 

taught  lesson  into  a  good  one, 
and  thus  snatch  victory  from  the  jaws  of 
defeat. 

» Op.  cit.,  p.  28  ff. 


XV 
SPECIAL  LESSONS 

THE  method  of  teaching  outHned  in 
this  book  applies  more  especially  to 
lessons  taken  from  the  biographical 
and  historical  narratives  of  Scripture,  from 
which  the  great  majority  of  Sunday-school 
lessons  are  taken.  But  now  and  then  a  les- 
son is  inserted  in  the  series  from  the  Psalms 
or  the  Epistles,  which  do  not  contain  so  large 
an  element  of  fact,  but  which  consist  of  gen- 
eral statements  of  truth  or  injunctions  to  con- 
duct. Such  lessons  will  call  for  a  somewhat 
different  treatment  from  that  which  has  been 
outlined  in  the  foregoing  chapters.  But  even 
in  teaching  such  lessons  the  teacher  must  not 
lose  sight  of  the  difficulty  of  teaching  abstract 
or  general  truths,  nor  of  the  importance  of 
linking  such  abstract  truths  with  concrete 
facts  which  make  their  appeal  to  the  imagi- 
nation of  the  pupil. 

148 


Special  Lessons  149 

In  the  teaching  of  a  passage  from  one  of 
Paul's   Epistles,  such   as  Romans  xiii.  8-14 

which  has  been  used  a  number 
t^KpZcs""        of  times   in  the  International 

series  as  a  Temperance  Lesson, 
the  teacher  may  find  concrete  material  in  the 
study  of  the  life  of  a  church  in  the  city  of 
Rome  at  the  time  this  Epistle  was  written, 
and  also  in  the  life  of  Paul.  She  may  form  a 
mental  picture  of  the  Church  at  Rome  ;  of 
their  place  of  meeting  ;  the  different  members, 
their  occupations,  their  dress,  and  their 
special  temptations  and  difficulties  in  leading 
a  Christian  life.  With  some  study  she  will 
be  able  to  produce  a  fairly  accurate  and 
complete  picture  of  the  life  of  a  Roman 
citizen  in  the  great  city  at  this  time.  She 
can  imagine  the  church  holding  a  service  at 
which  the  Epistle  is  first  read.  She  can  put 
herself  in  the  place  of  one  of  those  church- 
members  and  imagine  the  eagerness  which  she 
would  feel  when  a  letter  from  the  Apostle  was 
announced.  She  can  imagine  herself  making 
a  personal  application  of  the  many  helpful 
things  in  the  Epistle,  and  think  of  the  ways 


l^O  Final  Suggestions 

in  which  as  a  dweller  in  Rome,  in  the  first 
century,  she  might  put  into  practice  the  in- 
junctions of  the  Apostle.  Or  she  may  try  to 
put  herself  in  the  place  of  the  Apostle  at  the 
time  he  wrote  the  letter,  to  picture  his  sitting 
down  with  his  amanuensis  to  dictate  the  let- 
ter, his  eager  interest  in  the  far  distant 
church  which  he  had  never  seen,  but  of 
which  he  had  heard  from  a  number  of  his  in- 
timate friends  ;  and  his  anxiety  to  write  some- 
thing that  would  help  them  in  their  every- 
day life  amid  their  heathen  surroundings, 
and  thus  through  the  sympathetic  imagina- 
tion, she  may  put  herself  into  the  very  spirit 
of  the  Epistle  and  catch  something  of  its 
wonderful  spiritual  glow  and  fervour. 

So  in  the  study  of  such  a  Psalm  as  the 
twenty-third,  or  the  thirty-second,  or  the  fifty- 
first,  the  teacher  may  put  her- 
fhe^islta^'"  self  back  into  the  time  and 
circumstances  under  which 
they  were  written,  and  put  back  of  them  the 
concrete  personalities  and  concrete  life  and 
experience  out  of  which  they  were  written. 
Let  the  teacher  realize  that  all  literature  is  an 


Special  Lessons  151 

expression  of  life,  that  it  is  rooted  in  human 
experience  ;  that  these  writers  first  lived,  and 
felt  and  suffered,  and  then,  after  their  lives 
had  been  pressed  perhaps  for  long  years 
against  these  facts  of  human  experience,  they 
looked  back  upon  them  through  the  glow 
which  memory  and  imagination  give  to  the 
past,  and  they  sat  down  to  interpret  these  ex- 
periences and  to  give  expression  to  the  feel- 
ings stirred  in  their  hearts  by  them  and  thus 
they  revealed  in  beautiful  and  sublime  lan- 
guage the  thought  and  feelings  arising  from 
their  experience.  The  person  and  the  life 
must  therefore  be  put  back  of  the  Psalm  or 
Poem,  before  we  can  enter  into  full  sympathy 
with  it,  and  understand  its  meaning,  and 
grasp  its  message.  What  a  wonderful  piece 
of  writing  the  Twenty-third  Psalm  becomes 
when  studied  in  the  light  of  David's  experi- 
ence as  a  shepherd,  and  of  his  subsequent 
life  under  the  providential  guardianship  of 
God. 


XVI 

THE  CONSCIOUSNESS  OF  GOD 

THIS  is  not  a  treatise  on  religion  or 
theology.  It  is  a  book  on  how  to 
teach  and  not  on  what  to  teach. 
Yet  in  view  of  the  aim  set  forth  in  the  first 
chapter,  and  of  the  insistence  all  through  this 
book  upon  the  Citadel  of  the  Will  as  being 
the  objective  point  of  all  Sunday-school 
teaching,  it  seems  fitting  that  something 
should  here  be  said  as  to  the  truths  which 
will  have  the  greatest  and  most  direct  in- 
fluence upon  the  will  of  the  pupil. 

The  truths  which  are  found  in  the  Bible 

may  be  divided  into  two  classes:  (i)  those 

which  have  to  do  with  our  re- 

IfTruthr"  lations  to  one  another, and  (2) 

those  which  have  to  do  with 

God.     The   Bible   is   a   very   human    book. 

The  stories  and  incidents  related  of  its  many 

characters    are    told   with    such    simplicity, 

152 


The  Consciousness  of  God  1 53 

vividness,  unconscious  art,  and  truth  to  na- 
ture, that  as  a  text-book  for  the  study  of  hu- 
man life  it  has  no  equal.  But  this  is  not  the 
main  purpose  of  the  Bible.  Its  chief  purpose 
is  to  give  to  us  a  revelation  of  God.  It  is 
"  God's  Word,"  the  expression  of  His  char- 
acter, plan  and  purpose  in  the  world.  There- 
fore the  teacher  will  best  use  the  Bible  in  ac- 
cordance with  its  own  purpose,  if  she  seeks 
to  find  in  it  the  truth  concerning  God.  It  is 
not  meant  here  that  the  teacher  is  to  put  into 
the  lesson  something  that  it  does  not  clearly 
and  logically  teach.  Only  such  inferences 
should  be  drawn  as  arise  fairly  out  of  the 
facts.  But  whenever  the  facts  of  the  lesson 
will  permit  her  to  do  so,  the  teacher  should 
seek  to  make  God's  personality,  His  character 
and  His  will  clear  and  vivid,  showing  God  at 
work  in  and  through  the  characters  and  in- 
cidents, selecting  those  facts  which  reveal  God 
best,  and  seeing  to  it  that  no  Bible  character 
is  held  up  before  the  pupil  to  the  exclusion  of 
God,  but  that  each  person  is  shown  with  refer- 
ence to  the  relationship  which  he  occupies  to 
Him.     Every  actor  in  the  lesson  should  be 


154  Final  Suggestions 

subordinate  to  the  chief  character  in  the  drama 
of  redemption.  Thus  the  teacher  will  seek 
to  bring  the  mind,  heart  and  will  of  the  pupil 
into  vital  contact  with  the  mind,  heart  and 
will  of  God,  so  that  the  revelation  of  God  in 
the  Bible  shall  make  its  fullest  and  deepest 
impression  upon  him ;  so  that  his  conception 
of  God  shall  be  constantly  growing  in  depth, 
richness  and  power  ;  and  so  that  he  may  be 
one  of  those  of  whom  Paul  speaks  in  the  third 
chapter  of  Second  Corinthians  when  he  says : 
"  But  we  all  with  unveiled  face,  beholding  as 
in  a  mirror  the  glory  of  the  Lord,  are  trans- 
formed into  the  same  image  from  glory  to 
glory  even  as  from  the  Lord  the  Spirit." 

Here  again  let  the  teacher  note  that  the 
most  powerful  influences  upon  her  own  life 

have  been  those  emanating 
Personal^/  f^om  persons,  not  truths  about 

persons,  but  vivid  mental  pic- 
tures of  such  persons,  and  rich  mental  con- 
ceptions of  their  characters.  Influence  might 
almost  be  defined  to  be  "  the  motor  response 
to  an  imaged  personality."  The  writer  well 
remembers  the  time  when  he  first  left  home 


The  Consciousness  of  God  155 

to  live  in  a  distant  city,  and  how  when  he 
was  tempted  to  go  to  doubtful  places  of 
amusement,  the  face  of  his  mother  would 
rise  before  him,  and  it  seemed  as  though  he 
could  hear  her  voice  speaking  to  him  in 
gentle  reproof  and  warning.  The  memory 
of  that  face  and  of  that  voice  barred  the  way 
to  sin  many  a  time  in  his  life.  So  the  strong- 
est possible  influence  upon  the  pupil's  actions 
and  character  will  be  a  vivid  realization  of 
God  as  a  person,  with  a  rich  and  true  con- 
ception of  His  character. 

It  is  evident  that  such  an  aim  and  purpose 
as   this  must  have  much  influence   on   the 

teacher's  selection  of  lesson 
R^vMiGod  facts.      Some    teachers  seem 

to  have  a  prejudice  against 
teaching  facts.  They  feel  that  it  is  a  waste 
of  time,  for  example,  to  talk  about  the  distance 
from  Dan  to  Beersheba,  or  the  height  of 
Mount  Hermon,  or  how  many  times  the 
number  seven  is  used  in  the  Bible,  etc. 
There  is  a  large  amount  of  Bible  lore  that  is 
curious  and  which  may  be  very  interesting 
to   minds   having    a  love   for  facts,   but  a 


156  Final  Suggestions 

knowledge  of  which  does  not  help  much  in 
spiritual  insight  or  growth.  It  is  hoped  that 
the  preceding  chapters  have  made  it  clear 
that  it  is  not  the  study  of  such  facts  as  these 
that  is  advocated  in  this  book.  The  impor- 
tant facts  are  those  which  reveal  God  at  work 
in  the  world  and  which  by  their  appeal  to 
heart  and  imagination  make  His  character 
and  purpose  real  and  concrete  to  the  pupil. 

We  are  to  strive  then  as  teachers  to  make 
the  thought  of  God  one  of  those  which  lie 

cuitivatin  the  "^^'*  ^^^  surface  of  the  pupil's 
Pupil's  Conscious-     miud,  which  will  spring  into 

nessofGod  '^        ** 

the  centre  of  his  consciousness 
frequently,  and  which  will  even  work  upon 
his  subconscious  mind  in  a  way  to  influence 
his  actions.  We  wish  to  make  the  thought 
of  God  one  which  will  be  present  not  only  at 
rare  intervals,  as  when  he  says  his  prayers, 
or  when  he  feels  the  sting  of  conscience,  or 
when  he  is  in  trouble,  but  so  near  to  him  and 
so  frequently  recalled,  that  God  will  become 
in  thought  as  He  is  in  reality,  an  ever-present 
Saviour,  helper  and  friend,  sharing  in  his  in- 
nermost life,  sympathizing  with  him  in  his 


The  Consciousness  of  God  157 

sorrow,  grieving  over  his  sins  and  failures, 
and  rejoicing  with  him  in  his  happiness. 

We  are  reminded  again  that  it  is  the  law 
of  association  which  governs  the  passage  of 

ideas    from   the  subconscious 
Association  to  the  conscious  mind.     Those 

ideas  which  lie  nearest  to  the 
surface  of  the  subconscious  mind  are  those 
which  have  been  most  frequently  in  the  mind, 
which  come  out  most  plainly  in  the  centre  of 
consciousness,  and  which  thereby  form  the 
largest  number  of  associations.  Hence  the 
oftener  the  thought  of  God  is  brought  into 
the  consciousness  of  the  pupil,  the  more  real 
the  teacher  can  make  him  appear  to  the  pupil, 
and  the  closer  she  can  help  him  to  knit  up 
the  thought  of  God  with  his  daily  life,  the 
better  will  she  succeed  in  making  that 
thought  the  dominating  influence  on  his  life. 
Let  the  teacher  recall  the  growth  of  the 
consciousness  of  God  in  her  own  mind.     As 

she  has  studied  His  Word  and 
?<^rnVsl?;God"-    given  herself  to  His  service. 

she  has  found  Him  coming  as 
it  were  from  the  margin  to  the  centre  of  her 


1 58  Final  Suggestions 

consciousness.  He  is  no  longer  one  among 
many  persons,  He  has  become  the  chief  per- 
son ;  He  is  no  longer  one  with  whom  she 
occupies  a  vague,  far-off  relationship  ;  He  is 
one  with  whom  she  has  come  into  the  closest 
and  most  intimate  companionship  ;  He  is  no 
longer  one  who,  on  rare  occasions,  comes  to 
mind,  but  rather  is  He  seldom  absent  from 
it,  so  that  even  when  she  is  busy  about  other 
matters,  the  thought  of  Him  is  so  near  that 
it  may  at  any  moment  flash  into  her  con- 
sciousness. 

A  certain  small  boy  known  to  the  writer  is 
unusually  fond  of  his  mother.  If  you  should 
see  him  at  play,  you  would 
An  Illustration  think  that  his  mind  was  en- 
tirely fixed  upon  the  toy  he  is 
using  or  the  companion  with  whom  he  is 
playing.  But  watch  him  for  a  little  while, 
and  you  will  see  him  drop  his  toy  ;  there  is  a 
patter  of  feet  up  the  steps  and  along  the  hall- 
way ;  there  is  a  call  to  mother,  and  when  she 
is  found,  he  puts  his  arm  around  her  neck, 
and  says,  "  I  just  came  in  to  give  you  a  hug." 
From  his  earliest  years,  the  one  dominant 


The  Consciousness  of  God  159 

fact  of  that  boy's  consciousness  has  been  the 
presence,  love  and  care  of  his  mother.  So 
she  is  hardly  ever  absent  from  his  thought, 
and  when  he  is  busiest,  the  thought  of  her  is 
so  near  the  surface,  that  at  the  most  unex- 
pected moments  it  flashes  into  the  centre  of 
his  consciousness,  and  he  must  go  and  hug 
her.  This  occurs  many  times  a  day.  So  if 
we  could  only  get  the  thought  of  God  into 
the  minds  of  our  pupils  to  that  extent,  what 
would  it  not  mean  in  help  and  comfort,  in 
power  and  joy  in  their  lives ! 

When  God  thus  becomes  enthroned  in  the 
inner  life,  His  will  becomes  the  dominating 
influence  upon  that  life. 
Obedience  When    wc     think     of     Him 

often,  we  are  afraid  to  dis- 
obey Him.  It  is  because  we  forget  Him, 
and  allow  other  thoughts  to  come  in  and  take 
possession  of  our  minds,  that  we  sin  against 
Him  so  often. 

Again  when  God  is  enthroned  in  con- 
sciousness, love  for  Him  will  grow  deep  and 
strong.  It  is  another  law  of  our  minds  that 
we  learn  to  love  those  things  and  persons 


l6o  Final  Suggestions 

that  are  oftenest  present  there.     We  have  al- 
ready referred  to  our  love  of  home.     It  is  be- 
cause   the    objects    there   are 
Love  brought  before  our  minds  so 

often  that  we  learn  to  love  even 
the  inanimate  things  because  of  their  intimate 
association  with  our  lives.  How  much  more 
true  this  is  of  the  persons  in  the  home.  The 
strong  and  tender  ties  which  bind  husband 
and  wife,  parent  and  child,  brother  and  sister, 
together  show  how  natural  it  is  for  us  to  love 
those  with  whom  we  are  closely  associated, 
and  since  God  is  so  worthy  to  be  loved,  and 
since  His  care,  His  kindness  and  His  love 
are  so  much  greater  than  those  of  any  earthly 
friend,  we  can  be  sure  that  if  the  thought  of 
Him  is  often  present  in  the  minds  of  our 
pupils,  they  will  learn  to  love  Him. 

The  thought  of  God  was  the  dominating 

influence  in  the  life  and  teachings  of  Christ. 

At  the  age  of  twelve,  His  first 

^.^T'^G?/"'""'    recorded  utterance  shows  Him 

ness  ot  uod 

in  conscious,  loving  and  obe- 
dient relationship  to  God,  "  Wist  ye  not  I 
must  be  about  My  Father's  business?"     The 


The  Consciousness  of  God  i6i 

Gospel  of  John  might  ahnost  be  said  to  be 
a  study  ot  the  consciousness  of  Jesus,  and 
shows  that  the  thought  of  God  was  never 
absent  from  his  mind.  He  and  the  Father 
are  one,  and  seventy  times  in  those  few  chap- 
ters does  the  thought  of  God  come  out  in 
His  speech.  He  loved  to  talk  about  Him; 
He  talked  of  hardly  anything  else.  "  This  is 
life  eternal  that  men  should  know  Thee,  the 
only  living  and  true  God  and  Jesus  Christ 
whom  Thou  hast  sent."  For  this  He  came 
down  from  heaven  ;  for  this  He  lived  and 
taught ;  for  this  He  died  on  the  cross ;  for 
this  He  arose  from  the  dead  ;  for  this  He 
lives  and  rules  :  to  bring  the  human  race  into 
conscious,  loving  and  obedient  relationship 
to  God  ;  for  this  He  will  continue  to  reign 
until  the  knowledge  of  the  Lord  shall  cover 
the  earth  as  the  waters  cover  the  sea,  until 
the  end  shall  come  when  He  shall  have  de- 
livered up  the  kingdom  to  God,  even  the 
Father,  and  God  shall  be  all  in  all. 

So  it  is  in  Jesus  Christ  that  we  have  the 
full  revelation  of  God.  It  is  by  looking  into 
His    face,    studying    His   life,    following  in 


l62  Final  Suggestions 

His   footsteps,   and   giving  our  lives  to  His 

service,  that  we  come  into  closest  fellowship 

with  God.     And  so  it  is  the 

Jesus  Christ  the  j        f  the  Sundav-school  as 

Revelation  of  God  J 

Stated  in  the  first  chapter : 
**  To  bring  the  pupil  to  Christ,  to  build  him 
up  in  Christ,  and  to  send  him  forth  to  work 
for  Christ." 


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